That Should Be Me
by supernaturalglee
Summary: lea and darren had one steamy night together, and they both have feelings for each other, but lea is forced to date cory monteith for the sake of publicity. lea/darren & lea/cory /this addresses the actors, not the glee characters/
1. Chapter 1

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: I'm just gonna skip the awkward sexscene, but I'm gonna make other sexscenes. Sorry that the introscene stops a bit sudden. **

"Maybe we shouldn't be doing this," Lea whispered as Darren's lips gently ran down her soft neck. He loved the smell of her.  
"What's so wrong about it?" he said as he removed his lips from her damp neck. "We both want it."  
She sighed heavily, before turning around to face him, leaving him wondering what he did wrong.  
"It's wrong, because it's us, Darren," she said sadly and looked down. He lifted her chin with his index finger to make her look him in the eye.  
"Hey, listen to me," he began. "It's us, yes. That's what makes this so perfect."  
She slowly nodded, and went into his arms, slowly finding the way to his lips, caressing them with hers. He put his arms around her, laying her down on the bed, in the big dark room, only lit by a few candles. He slowly started unbuttoning her blouse, smirking as he did so. She lifted her upper body, so he could pull it off her, and after doing so he gently threw it onto the floor.

DARREN'S POV:  
Last night with Lea had been absolutely amazing, she was absolutely amazing. I kind of wondered if the rest of the guys would be able to feel an odd vibe about us today, when we were going to shoot Glee. I certainly didn't hope so. A relationship with a cast member, was not something I wanted out so quickly. I got to set about twenty minutes before we actually had to be there, and found Lea hadn't arrived yet. So, I sat, and waited for her. Finally she walked through the door, but something was not right. She wasn't alone. She was holding Cory Monteith's hand. I didn't know what I felt, it was like I felt nothing. I guess this was how it felt like to _really_ feel jealous. The worst part was that I had her last night, and we were so close, and bonding so much, and then the next day, she's holding another man's hand. It was like I could hear my heart shatter into a thousand pieces. She glanced me, when she walked in, almost gave me a pitiful look. I had no expression, and everything was slowmotion in my head. Lea looked away again, smiling up to Cory. Suddenly Cory stopped her, and leaned down to kiss her. I felt sick to my stomach, and I just wanted to kill them, both. I had never felt lower.

I think it was safe to say that I had fallen in love with Lea Michele.


	2. Chapter 2

LEA'S POV:

I walked into the choir room set, hand in hand with Cory Monteith, and the first thing I laid my eyes on were Darren. He was staring at me and Cory, like he was completely broken. I kept reminding myself of last night; how amazing it had been. Especially because it was with Darren and not with Cory. I didn't like Cory that way, but Ryan Murphy wanted us to fake-date, just to make the show look better. He had even threatened with firing us, if we didn't do it. I wish the publicity stunt could've just been with Darren, because I'm pretty sure I was actually_ in love_ with him. I tried to tell Darren that it was not real dating, by giving him an expression, but I'm sure I ended up looking like a gloating bitch. Cory stopped suddenly, looked at me worriedly, and began to lean down. I knew what he was going to do. He was going to kiss me, because Ryan was right over in the corner and he wanted to show him that he was actually capable of doing it.  
Right in this moment, I felt like quitting my job, just so I could be with Darren instead. But at heart, I was just like Rachel; so willing to perform, I'd give up anything to do it.  
Cory had stopped kissing me after a good amount of time, and I looked to Darren, to see what he looked like, and he looked so hurt, I actually felt pain in my chest.  
"Cory, would you just excuse me for a second?" I asked him. He smiled, and let go of my hand. I skipped over to Darren, who sat on a chair, staring at me. "Hey..."  
"Hi," he said hoarsely. He cleared his throat. "So, um... You and Cory, huh?"  
I could just hear the hurt in his voice. "No, Darren," I said. I knew I wasn't allowed to tell him that it was fake, but I had to. "Ryan called us to a meeting this morning, just me and Cory-"  
"So?" he interrupted. I sighed.  
"Would you let me finish?" I said. He nodded slowly and looked me in the eye. "He wanted to tell me and Cory to be boyfriend and girlfriend."  
"What!" Darren yelled outraged. A few people looked toward our direction, including Cory. I just smiled at him, making him turn his head again.  
"I know," I said quietly. "He threatened to fire us, if we didn't do it. It's some crazy publicity stunt."  
"He can't do that," Darren said completely closed off. Then he looked at me, "I mean... is that even legal?"  
"I don't know," I said. "But Darren, I'm so sorry. The only thing I can do right now, is to quit-"  
"But you don't want to do that," he finished my sentence. I nodded. "I completely understand. And just don't have sex with him."


	3. Chapter 3

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: I apologize for the awkward sexscene... I'm just a very awkward person. Um, yeah I also apologize for the story being kinda slow, but I promise, we're gonna get some drama in the next couple of chapters. **

LEA'S POV:

During lunch on the set, where I sat with Cory, Darren had carefully slipped me a note that read: _"meet me in my dressingroom, after lunch_."

I felt excited to meet Darren after lunch, especially because it meant he hadn't taken the whole Cory thing, that hard. I suppose I couldn't blame him if he did take it hard, because it was pretty harsh. Cory was a slow eater, and I pretty much just wanted to jerk the food into his mouth, so I could get going. I knew Darren was already in the dressing room.  
"Um, I really need to go to the bathroom, do you mind?" I asked Cory. He just shook his head, taking a bite of his sandwich. Things had been awkward between me and Cory for the entire day.

I hurried down to Darren's dressing room and knocked three times. I waited for not so long, until he opened the door. I got in as quickly as I could, and stood behind him as he locked the door. He turned around and looked me in the eye, and I couldn't help but giggle a bit. His eyes were so beautiful, it was almost intimidating.  
"Hi," he said, in a very low voice. I smiled.

"Hey," I said and walked toward him. He took me in his arms. "Suddenly this all feels like a bad place."

"My dressing room?" Darren asked confusedly. I shook my head, against his warm chest.

"No," I whispered. Then I talked a bit louder. "The set. I almost can't even look at Cory. It's going to be impossible doing scenes with him."  
A tear escaped my eye, which Darren noticed, so he wiped it away. He held me out from his arms, and looked me in the eye.

"Listen to me," he said with a smile on his face. "Ryan's a dick. Sorry, but it's true. And he just wants to make more money, so he thinks this little stunt will work, but he'll quickly enough find out it won't work and he'll let you off the hook."

I nodded. "You're probably right, I just can't seem to see how that will help right now," I complained. "It can be months until he realizes. I don't want to be with him for that long."  
I hesitated for a little while. "I really just want to be with you, Darren," I spoke so low he almost didn't hear me.

"I want to be with you too, Lea. So much," he said, and slowly let go of me. "A night like last night, tells something. We definitely had sparks."

I smiled, looked to the ground and removed a lock of hair. He looked intensely at me with a smile.

"Now can I please kiss you?" he asked. I laughed and nodded. His lips smacked up against mine, and I couldn't help but laugh while he kissed me, so our teeth grined against each other. Finally I bounced back and kissed him properly. His tongue begged for my mouth to open further more up, so he could taste my mouth. I slowly opened my mouth, feeling his tongue enter, feeling around in my mouth. We parted to catch our breaths and I began to lift his shirt off his body. I lifted it over his head and threw it on the couch he had placed up against a wall, in the dressing room. His head moved closer to mine and he resumed the kiss. I felt all around his torso, feeling how nice his abs were. I smiled in the middle of the kiss, causing him to pull away and laugh at me. He smirked and started to unbutton my shirt. I helped him at one point, where he got stuck. He threw my shirt against the door. I was now in my bra, and pants.

"You've no idea how hot that is," he said referring to the way I was "dressed".

"What about yourself," I said and eagerly went back to kissing him, hungrily. This time he felt all over my stomach, and started caressing my boobs. I kissed outside of his mouth and moved down to his neck, where when I hit the right spots he'd moan, which was probably the sexiest thing I'd ever heard. He suddenly pushed me down on the couch, and placed himself on top of me. I started sucking on his neck again, until he wanted to unbutton my pants. When he was trying to pull them down, I lifted my abdomen, so he could get him entirely off. He threw them across the room, so they landed on his computer. We looked at each other and laughed, and then he continued to kiss my lips. I cut him off.

"Sit up," I demanded. He did as I said, and I let my hands dig down to unbuckle his belt. He got up himself to take his pants off. I noticed his major boner, and bit my lip. He smirked when he saw it, and then laid down again to kiss my neck. I quickly got us to shift places, so I was on top. He started to undo my bra and I let it slip off my arms. He instantly grabbed onto my breasts, squeezing them. I moaned occasionally. I kissed all the way from his abdomen up to his mouth, and he started giggling as I almost hit his lips.

"What's so funny," I mumbled on his lips, while giggling a bit. He laughed.

"I don't know," he laughed and grabbed me tightly and kissed me hungrily. I smiled as he kissed me, but then cut him off and stood up.

"You're not leaving _now_, are you?" he asked with a grin. I shook my head and started to pull his boxers off, letting his boner free. He quickly grabbed onto my panties and jerked them off. I stepped out of them and crawled back on him. I crawled onto his penis, settling myself. He moaned like crazy, and I moaned occasionally too. I started doing little hops, as he held onto my hips.

"Lea, oh! Lea," he moaned. I wanted to say something, but the pleasure kept me from being able to talk. I hopped faster and faster, letting the pleasure absorb me, almost letting me enter a whole new world.

"I," I stuttered. I just couldn't speak. He moaned, yet again. His moans had begun to sound like an angel singing. I was hopping very quickly now, almost killing myself with the pure pleasure that came out of this. It was like Darren and I melted together into one. I'd never felt more home. I felt my lower stomach region tighten and I could tell from Darren's face that he also felt the tightening feeling. I let out a silent scream.

"Lee, I'm so close to being there," he said under his breath. I tried to nod, but his eyes were closed, so no matter if I had succeeded to nod, he wouldn't have seen it.

"Dare," I managed to get out as we both reached climax together. I slid off the penis, and just laid on him. He ran his fingers through my hair. He was having trouble catching his breath, but he was smiling. I sucked on his lower lip, causing him to smile.


	4. Chapter 4

DARREN'S POV:

"Well, that was quite something," I smirked to Lea, who was buttoning her shirt. She giggled and walked closer to me.

"Yeah, one thing I must give you," she began as she kept buttoning. "You're _amazing _in bed."

She bit her lip, as she watched me putting on my shirt. Everything was fine, until she had to go outside again, so for now I just wanted to stay in this dressing room with Lea forever. No, wait. Oh my God!

"Lea, the camera's Ryan put up in the dressing rooms!" I exclaimed, and pointed to the corner of the ceiling. She looked frightened, holding her hands in front of her mouth. She was panicking; running around in a little circle.

"Fuck! You have _got _to be kidding me!" she screamed loudly, with tears in her eyes. "I completely forgot!"

Ryan had put up the camera's because he didn't want any of the cast members to have sex in their dressing room, and up until now that had worked fine. How could we have been this stupid? I wanted to curse at myself for dragging Lea through this when she already had so much on her mind.

"Maybe we can retrieve the tape," I suggested. She removed her hands from her mouth, and looked as if she actually considered my suggestion. She lost the eye contact we had, and looked to the door.

"You're right," she said slowly. "They have to be in Ryan and Ian's office. We can delete them from the harddrive, and nobody will ever see that tape."

I nodded. The downside was of course also, that because we were celebrities, our risk of getting hacked and the tape getting leaked was a lot higher than normal people's. Every media in America had heard about Ryan's "sexurity-camera" and of course that led to Ian and Ryan getting a lot more hacked. If we had to get that video, we should get it quickly. I didn't put shoes on, I just grabbed Lea's hand and ran out in the hallway and followed the long path down to RIB's office.

"Can you get the door open?" Lea asked me after she checked if it was open and found it was locked. I nodded.

"Yeah, actually, if you have a bobby pin," I answered. She grinned, and handed me the one that held an extra lock of hair away from her face. I stuck it into the keyhole, and twisted it until the door popped open. Lea looked impressed. We went into their office and turned on the lights. Lea closed the door.

"This place could really use a makeover," she said as she went around sliding her fingers along bookshelves, plants and paintings. I looked at her with a look that said '_can we just get this done already' _and then she ran to me, by the computer. "Fuck, password."

"Wait, let me try something," I said and typed in '_gleeamericanhorrorstorythene wnormal_' and what do you know, that was the password. Lea looked stunned, and proud. She gave me a clap on the shoulder. I clicked on a folder that said "cams", found the right date and time and started looking for my dressing room number. When I found it I delete that entire folder, so we wouldn't have to run over the videos. That would simply be _too_ embarrassing. Lea did a little jump of happiness and hugged me.

"Thanks, Dare," she said. "How'd you figure out the password, though?"

We went turned off the light, and went out of the office. "Easy. His three shows, sorted by popularity," I explained. Lea looked like captain obvious, and nodded. On the way back to my dressing room, Cory was outside waiting for Lea, I guessed.

"Guys," he said in a serious tone. "We really need to talk about this... _thing_."

"What is there to talk about?" Lea asked grimly. "When Ryan says something, there's nothing you can do to change it."

"No, but we have to make sure that we're doing it well," Cory began. "And going off having sex with another man, in the lunch break is _not _doing it right!"

"But Cor, you and I are not in love!" Lea protested. Cory shrugged. "Neither Ryan nor you can prevent me from being with the man I love."

I felt really awkward being the third wheel, standing there, over watching their conversation, but remaining quiet. Lea grabbed my hand, and squeezed it. I gently squeezed back. I knew she was kind of uncomfortable.

"If you fuck this up, Lea, it's going out on me too! Don't fuck it up for me," he begged her. She bit her lip, and looked at Cory with sad eyes. She shrugged lightly.

"Fine," she finally agreed. "I won't be with Darren in public, but in my leisure, you cannot decide what I do with him. Plus I don't want to spend my leisure with you."

"I can live with that. Just don't get caught with Darren," he said and shrugged in my direction, "your entire reputation will be ruined, and I care about you, so I wouldn't want to see that happen to you."

Lea smiled, but it was a fake smile. "I _am _capable of managing myself, y'know," she spat. She turned around and went into my dressing room. Cory and I fist bumped before I followed Lea. "Can you believe him!"

I was confused. "What do you mean?" I asked. Lea dumped her tiny body on my couch.

"He's so in love with his career that he's willing to hurt me, Hell, anyone, to get what he wants!" she yelled. I started to give her a back massage. "Oh thank you, Dare, that's nice."

"Honey, this situation in itself is quite sticky, but what about you and I try to talk to Ryan?" I asked. Her shoulders tensed. Her head turned in my direction, she was trying to look at me.

"I don't know if that would be such a good idea," she said quietly. "Maybe he'd keep us away from each other, and maybe even cancel Blaine and Rachel's scenes."

"Ryan sounds more and more like Satan," I spat. I really fucking hated Ryan at this point.

"He's a sadistic bastard," she said, still quiet.


	5. Chapter 5

LEA'S POV:

After Glee, Darren and I went home to my apartment, after a lot of struggle to avoid paparazzi. If a paparazzi took pictures of us, we'd be fucked. We had to park in the garage of the apartment, which I had never used before, so we also struggled with that.

"Wow, this place is creepy," Darren commented on the parking garage. He was right, though. It was pretty creepy.

"Yeah, but it's the only way we are _sure_ to avoid paps," I said. The garage led a direct stairway up into my apartment. We walked up the stairs hand in hand, staying quiet. I wasn't really talkative right now, either. I was pretty fucking mad at Ryan. I unlocked my apartment and went inside. My dog Pixie came running from my bedroom. "Hi, baby!"

She jumped up and down me and licked my legs, face and hands. Then she ran to Darren and started licking him.

"Hi, Pixie!" Darren said. He knew her, because he'd taken care of her a few times, and also because of yesterday night. I went to the kitchen and got a bag of dog snacks and handed a few to Darren to give to Pixie. He accepted the crackers by giving me a kiss. He handed the snacks to Pixie and she was crazed with happiness. After she was done eating she jumped up in the couch and laid there, like some queen of a palace. Darren laughed. "That dog is crazy! But the cutest dog ever."

"I know," I laughed and got Darren and I two beers. "Where did I put the opener..?"

"Let me," Darren said and picked up a knife. He opened both beers with it. I looked fascinated at him. He handed me my beer and put his arms around my waist as we went to sit next to Pixie in the couch. Darren patted her once, and then looked at me.

"I'm sorry, I'm not very talkative today," I said and took a sip from my beer. He smiled.

"It's totally okay, sweetie," he said in the cutest way. "I totally get it with all that you've been pushed through today."

"Thank you. I just... I look at Cory completely differently now, and I don't like that," I rambled. Darren nodded and pushed his eyebrows together. "I feel like I can't even look at him anymore."

"Baby, I totally know what you mean," he said. "I don't know how it feels, though. But it must be terrible."

I lifted the bottle, signaling that he was right. "Ding, ding, ding!" I yelled, and clutched my beer with his. We both sipped. "Y'know what? I'm going to call Ryan."

"You're not nearly drunk enough for that, yet," he advised. I grimaced, but then I realized he was right. We had to get me good and wasted.

"You are right, Darren! I'm going to the liquor cabinet, and then we're going to get me drunk," I said, placed my beer on the coffee table and ran to the liquor cabinet. I took out vodka, Jägermeister, Bacardi and Sommersby out, and went back to Darren.

"Holy shit," he cooed and laughed. "That's going to help on the drunk part."

He took a sip of his beer, as I emptied mine. I went to get two glasses, and then I put them on the table. I poured Jägermeister in the cups first, and I drank it like a shot. It burned in my throat, but I didn't care. It'd been a long time since I had gotten drunk last, plus I needed to be drunk to talk to Ryan. Darren took his cup and poured it all down at once, just like I had done. We poured some more in our cups, cheered and emptied it all in one mouthfull. We continued like this with all the drinks, until there was no more, and me and Darren both were tipsy. I found my phone, where I could barely see what I was doing, and dialed Ryan. Or I was pretty sure it was.

_"Hello?" _his demonic voice said grimly in the other end of the line.

"Ryan! Murphy!" I yelled. "I need to... talk to you..."

_"Lea? Are you drunk?" _he asked dumbly.

"No! I am _very _drunk," I said, feeling like the entire room was spinning. Darren sat next to me laughing and occasionally kissing me. "I don... do not! like your _stupid _rule that I _have _to date Cory Monteith!"

_"Lea, you have to understand we're doing it for the show," _he tried to make me understand.

"What does that m-matter... when I'm in love with Da... Darren Criss!" I spat. Darren laughed uncontrollably now.

_"You have no idea what you're saying. You're very intoxicated. Are you at your apartment?" _

"Yes. Or should I say no, if you... would rather like me to be at Cory's! And... fucking his brains out," I stuttered.

_"Okay, this conversation is over," _he said angrily. _"Show up __**sober**__ tomorrow!" _

__And just like that, my conversation with Ryan Murphy was over, and I found myself on a couch laughing with Darren, while he was completely touching me up.


	6. Chapter 6

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: Sorry, that I'm changing POV in the middle of the story, but Di and Lea's phone conversation wouldn't be something Darren would be able to hear. And btw, there are gonna be other people's POVs just to make the situation more interesting :) **

DARREN'S POV:

I woke up with a lot of hair on my face, with I tried to untwirl me from. When I finally succeeded, it turned out to be Lea's hair. I looked at her beautiful face and smiled a bit to myself, before I got up and began to look for breakfast. I knew I probably had to look for eggs, to suck up the remaining alcohol in my body and maybe also get me rid of the major headache that had begun to show up when I got off the couch.

"Where am I?" Lea mumbled from the couch. My sounds must've woken her up.

"You're home," I said in a low tone, to not hurt her head. She looked at me; dark circles under her eyes and hair completely messed up. But she was still beautiful to me. She nodded slowly and approached me. When she reached me, she put her arms around my waist and started rocking back and fourth. I turned around in her grip so I was face to face with her. I kissed her on the forehead causing her to smile, as best as she could, considering she was insanely hungover. "What do you say, we get rid of that headache?"

"Sounds good," she said hoarsely. She sat by the kitchen table as I started to get out the eggs and milk.

"Where do you keep the bowls?" I asked her. She smiled and pointed to a cabinet right next to the fridge. I got out a very pink bowl and placed it on the counter. I cracked eggs into the bowl, stirred them with a fork and then added the milk. She kept the pans above the stove on the wall. They all hung on a fine rack. I took one of the smallest ones, and placed it on the stove. I poured the egg-mix on the pan and turned on the heat.

"I didn't know you cooked," Lea said quietly. I turned around to face her.

"Eh, it was just something that I learned in college," I answered. I wasn't that good at cooking, but it was all edible. "Joey sucked, so I had to learn."

She laughed, and leant her head on her right arm. "Maybe one day you need to cook for us," she said and lifted her eyebrows playfully.

"I didn't say I was good at it," I laughed. She let out a louder laugh. "It's edible, sure, but no award worthy."

Lea laughed her usual angelic laugh and smiled. "Well tough luck, Criss. I want to taste," she joked with a smirk. I smiled and went back to the stove to scramble the eggs.

"Okay, but if I poison you, it's your own fault," I said, my back facing her.

"Not if you planned to do it," she joked cockily. I rolled my eyes, and grinned. When the eggs were done, I grabbed a plate and put them there. I served them on the table Lea was at and got out two forks. I found it romantic to eat off the same plate. "Wow, Darren this is really good."

"Well, it's just eggs," I said. I sat down with her and took a bite. "Wow, okay it is actually really good."

Lea chuckled, and took more bites. I ate slowly, but I felt myself getting less drowsy. So it was actually helping.

"We have to work today," Lea suddenly said sadly. I gave her a pitiful look, and went to get glasses. She just stared into thin air.

"It's not that bad. I'm going to be there with you," I replied and placed a glass in front of her. She changed her sight to look at the glasses. I took out the milk and poured in her cup and the cup I had in my head. I put back the milk and sat down.

"Sure, but we can't even be ourselves, because Ryan doesn't want the others to know that _you and I _are dating, and not Cory and I," she explained and drank some of the milk.

"Still," I began. "We have the dressing room."

She smiled cockily, but the smile faded quickly. "It's not the same, to have your friends expect you love another man, than the one you actually do," she said grimly. "Plus, it's lying to them."

"Is it _really _that bad to tell _them?" _I asked. She nodded, keeping her eyes off me. However, I couldn't keep my eyes of her.

"According to Ryan, it is," she said and looked up at me. She almost stared at me. "God, I hate him!"

She suddenly got frustrated and hit her table hardly. I watched her face as a tear escaped from her eye, and ran down her cheek. I walked over to her, knelt and hugged her. I brushed the tear off her face, and lifted her to go to the couch with her. I placed her on my lap and laid down. I began to run my fingers through her hair. She had her head on my chest, and I could feel her soft breath against my arm.

"It's all going to be okay," I reminded. "Remember what I told you, he'll realize that this stunt won't work and you're off the hook."

"What if... Just _what if _you and I wanted to get married, huh? Then we wouldn't be able to do it," she said and closed her eyes. Her home phone suddenly rang, and I scooped out under her to get it.

"Lea's phone, Darren speaking," I said quickly. Lea just stared at me, while laying on her left side on the couch.

_"Darren? What are you doing at Lea's?" _it was Dianna, Lea's best friend. I panicked. I didn't know what to answer.

"She was just, um, sad about something... and, um, she called me," I stuttered my way through it.

_"Um, you __**do **__know that she's dating Cory, right?" _her words dug through me like knives.

"I'm _very _aware," I said hurtful, and sighed.

_"Okay... Anyways, put Lea on the phone, Dare," _Dianna demanded. I held the phone away from my hear and hold the speaker piece.

"Do you want to talk to Dianna?" I asked her. She took a moment to think about it, but then wrestled herself up from the couch and took the phone out of my hand and put it to her ear.

"Di," Lea mumbled into the phone. She wasn't even happy about talking to Dianna, so she was really down. Dianna was like a candle, when Lea was in darkness. She lit up her world.

LEA'S POV:

_"Why didn't you tell me you were dating Cory!" _Her slightly hoarse voice cooed in the other end of the line. I wanted to just yell at her that it was all just a lie.

"I don't know," I almost whispered. I felt like I wasn't even there, like I was just air. If Darren hadn't been staring at me, I would've thought I had melted into the ground.

_"Well, you need to tell a best friend that stuff. I just read it. __**Online! **__How does the internet know before I do?" _she complained. I sighed, but then I realized that Ryan must've tipped somebody off about it.

"Wait, you _read_ about it?" I asked confusedly. She said yes. I just got so angry I could've thrown punches. "That little fuck!"

_"Um, what?" _Dianna asked, disoriented. _"Who's a little fuck?" _

"No one, eh... just Darren! He's doing funny faces. Okay, um, got to go. Love you, bye," I hurried and hung up. "Ryan leaked Cory and I!"

Darren looked confused, but then realized what I meant with "leaked". "You are kidding! That twat!" he yelled angrily. Darren was starting to get affected by this situation. "Lea, you'll have to control me at work, because I might just get away and murder him!"

I walked over to him and took his hand. "This is going to be-" I began. He cut me off.

"No! Screw the bullshit, I said! Ryan's an insane bastard and won't make you two stop! He'll keep it up for... as long as the _fucking _show runs! You and I will _never _get to actually be together in public," he freaked out completely. He'd let go of my hand, and I had stepped away from him.

"Darren, please just... stop. Take it easy," I said with tears in my eyes. "I'll quit the show, then. _Then _we can be together. Okay?"

"No," he said more calmly. He walked to me and looked me in the eye. "I don't want you to quit. I just want Ryan out of there."

"Dare, I think that's what me and Cory wants too," I whispered. Darren shook his head heavily and cupped his face. He started scratching his eyebrow.

"Cory's not in love. We are. Ryan's practically making you cheat," he explained. I tightened my face.

"I'd say he was making us act," I said a little louder now. Darren sighed.

"Not when we're feeling like shit," he explained. "Acting's supposed to be fun. This isn't fun, this is dreadful! And it's tearing on both of us."

I knew he was right, but it was just really time for me to be positive. And I couldn't bear all this right now. The only thing to do at this point was to talk to Ian Brenning about this.


	7. Chapter 7

LEA'S POV:

I had gotten in my car and started driving toward the set, alone, since Darren and I couldn't be seen together going from my apartment. He had to take the bus or the train. When I got to the set I was so frustrated, I wanted to kill somebody. I put my sunglasses on and went to the choir room. Everybody was staring at me expecting me to go to Cory. And so I did - for Ryan to see.

"Cory," I said pretending to be in love. He was sitting down, so I decided to give him a kiss on the cheek to make it more authentic. He leaned in, to whisper something in my ear.

"So now you like pretending? Or did Darren break up with you, and you want a booty call?" he asked sassily. I sighed, rolled my eyes, and pulled away from his face.

"I like my job, okay? And if it means being a lying bitch to keep it, I'll do it," I answered.

"I'm sorry. I don't want us to fight," he said. "This isn't our fault. It's Ryan's."

I nodded. "You're right," I said. "I don't want to fight, either. I just want you to understand that I'm in love with Darren. That will never be you."

"I'm one hundred percent clear with that," he said. He looked at me intensely. "You know... we should probably kiss. To make it all more real."

"Yeah," I said darkly. He leaned in. He was about 1,5 inches away from my face.

"Let's give 'em a show," he said and smacked his lips against mine. My hands shot to his hair and I closed my eyes. He deepened the kiss. The longer we did it, the more wrong it felt. He wasn't Darren. Finally we parted, and I looked at him.

"So, are we going to stay together for the entire day?" I asked, grimly.

"Yeah, but I'm sure you can go away for a little while," he said and nodded toward the door. I looked questioningly at him, but then turned around. I saw Darren, with his usual smile. He wasn't dressed as Blaine, which meant I still had time alone with him. He walked over to Chris, while I approached them both.

"Hi," I said, only looking at Darren. He smiled at me, like he'd did before there was something going on between us.

"Hey, Lee," he said. Chris didn't say anything, he just looked at us.

"Remember that we, uh... agreed to me... um... doing your hair!" I yelled a bit when I found an excuse.

"Oh yeah, we should probably do that now," he said. We turned around and began to walk.

"Lea!" Chris said. "Can I talk to you for a minute?"

"Um, sure... Darren just go ahead. I'll meet you in my dressing room," I said.

"Congratulations... on the, uh... dating," he said skeptically.

"Thank you," I mumbled. Then I realized I should probably overdo it a bit. "I just really love Cory and-"

"Stop it, already, would you?" Chris said cockily. "You're not dating Cory."

I fake laughed like a maniac, I didn't want him to know. "What! That's crazy, of course I am!" I kept laughing, but stopped when he still wasn't and was staring me down. "Okay, I'm not."

"No. You're dating Darren," he said with his usual voice, being himself again. "Lee, honey... you were practically undressing him with your eyes, you really need to take an intro course in subtlety."

I grinned a bit. "Sorry," I said. He put his hand on my shoulder. "Ryan... he, um... he wanted me and Cory to date, for the sake of publicity for the show."

"What! That's irrelevant for this show! It's not going to do any good," Chris said. I nodded, agreeing with him. "Why would he even do that?"

"I guess he ships us," I said sarcastically.

"Well, I suppose that's one way to make your _otp _happen," he joked. I laughed, but then turned serious.

"And it's fucked up, because... I love Darren," I confessed. Chris looked surprised.

"Oh my God! I thought you two were just fooling around," he said, covering his mouth with his hands. "Go to him! Just remember that Ryan put cameras in the rooms!"

I was already running down to Darren. I opened my dressing room and found him in my FatBoy on the floor.

"What took you so long?" he said and smirked. I sat on his lap, and kissed him. I instantly grabbed onto his hair, twirling it around. He sucked on my bottomlip, and I needed to pull away before we went too far.

"Okay, loverboy, we need to stop now," I said pointing to the camera in the corner of the ceiling. "Get in the chair, I'm actually doing your hair."

He did as I said and got in the chair. I went outside to get hairgel and when I came back Darren was on his phone tweeting. Suddenly he turned around and took a picture of me. He grinned to himself and tweeted something. I went to him and poured as much gel as I could into his hair. He laughed like crazy, as I took out my phone and tweeted the picture with the caption "Darren should've never let me do his hair." I spread out the gel, and when you couldn't see it anymore, I separated the hair in his left side.

"Hello, Blaine," Darren joked. I smiled, and of course, as I did, Darren took another picture of me, and posted it. I went to twitter to look at his posted pictures and saw that the first one he'd posted had the caption "look who decided to do my hair." and the second one said "cutest hairstyler ever."

"Aw, baby," I said to him and kissed him. I sat on his lap, and turned on the mirror-camera, to take a picture of us. "Hmm, what should it say?"

"Let me," he said and took the phone. When he was done typing he handed it to me.

"_Don't we make the cutest styler-stylist couple, ever?_" I read out. I smiled and posted it. Then he kissed me on the cheek and ran his fingers through my hair. Suddenly we heard two knocks on the door and as the door opened I jumped off Darren's lap. The person entering was Ryan.

"Can I talk to you two, in my office, for a moment?" he asked. We both looked at each other, then looked back at him and nodded slowly. We followed him, holding hands, because we were sure that no cast member would be down here, right now. He opened the door and led us in first. We sat in the chairs across his desk. "It's about something Ian and I found on the security cams."

Darren and I looked at each other in panic. It was us, having sex, on that tape.

"We can explain," Darren began. Ryan held a finger up, signaling to stop.

"This just needs to stop. Now I want to show you the tape, so you can see what pain it was for me to watch it," he said and turned his macbook around pointing the video at us. I saw me on top of Darren, and I buried my face in his chest. He put his arms around me.

"Stop the video, please," Darren said. "Look at her..."

I heard the video stop and looked back up at Ryan. "Funny thing is that this is actually taken from the backup folder, as if someone swooped in and deleted the original video."

"It was us, okay? We deleted the original video, because we were afraid that we'd either get hacked and leaked or that you'd discover," Darren explained. Ryan was completely emotionless on his face.

"Guys," he finally said, after staring at us for about a minute. "I'm aware of the situation here, but either you break up or you stop pulling off stuff like this! Lea's officially with Cory, now."

"Why is it you think this'll help the show?" I asked without thinking. He looked stunned. "It's not going to help. It's not like people will watch the show because the two stars are dating."

"The headlines makes it all more appealing," he explained. "Now get out of here. And don't show your faces together. You're with Cory, Lea. _All _the time."

We went out of his office, feeling like we'd been beat up by the mafia's drugdealers. I looked at Darren, whom put his arms around me and kissed the top of my head. "It's all going to work out," he whispered.


	8. Chapter 8

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: yup, again. No drama, just feelings. trust me in the next chapter there will be a situation that turns everything upside down. i hope this wasn't too boring, though :) **

DARREN'S POV:

The rest of the day I had stayed with Chris because Ryan told Lea and I, that we weren't aloud to be together on the set. I had gone home, alone. When I unlocked the door, I went straight into the apartment and turned on my MacBook, to go on Tumblr. Turns out that the fact that I went on there was quite useful. Apparently an "anonymous" source had confirmed that Lea and Cory were going to the Grammy's together. I felt my heart drop to the bottom of my stomach. I had to lie down for a moment. I thought about how that could've been me. Hell, that _should_ be me. I'm her boyfriend, for Christ's sake! I went to the kitchen counter and grabbed my phone. I found Ian Brennan in my phonebook and called him.

"Hello?" he answered.

"Ian, this is Darren," I said, almost not able to hold my anger in. Before he could answer, I talked again. "What the actual fuck, are you and Ryan thinking about?"

"I'm sorry, I don't understand," he said confusedly. It was probably all just an act though, because he and Ryan were like bitches when it came to talking about their life.

"You know damn well what I mean! You saw the fucking tape," I freaked out. He sighed in the other end of the line. "Now tell me why the fuck, you couldn't just tell Dianna and Cory to date or Jenna and Harry? Why Lea and him..?"

"They're the stars, Darren. Our viewer graf has already went up by three percent since they went official," he explained. I didn't want to hear any of it.

"Don't you think it would've gone up if any other people were dating?" I said. My heart was aching. "What about Naya and Heather? Make them date. Just not him and her."

"Darren, we've made up our mind," Ian said, cold. "I know you two are like... sexbuddies-"

"I am in love with her!" I yelled at the phone, cutting him off. "You have no idea what it feels like watching your girlfriend, having to be with another guy! She can't even touch me in public!"

"It's just momentarily," he tried to calm me. But I didn't buy his shit.

"That doesn't make anything better," I said agitatedly and hung up. I dumped my body on the couch, letting a few tears come out, before it turned into a giant sob. Suddenly my doorbell rung, and I didn't even want to get it, but for some reason I got up and opened the door anyways. It was my best friend: Joey, standing with pizza and beer. He was shocked when he saw my face.

"Oh my God, what happened, Dare?" he said and went inside. I closed the door behind him, and then wiped my face.

"I'm having... work trouble, I guess," I said as he put the pizza and beer on my counter.

"Work trouble that's worth crying over?" he said, clearly not believing me. "Aw, come on. Tell me what it is."

"I'm in love," I said quickly and looked away from his eyes. I could feel him staring at me.

"Who is she?" Joey asked, sitting down on my bar chair. "Or he, if you've switched sides."

"It's Lea."

"Lea... as in Lea Michele?" he asked. I nodded slowly and looked him in the eye again. "Holy shit. But she's dating Cory."

"No, that's exactly what she isn't," I said annoyed. He looked at me like he wanted an explanation. "She and I are dating. But fucking Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan has banned Lea and I from each other, and they're forcing her to date Cory."

"Um, is that even legal?"

"Maybe not, they're doing it for the show and they're saying that they'll fire Lee and Cory, if they don't stick it out," I explained. "I guess it's blackmailing."

Joey nodded opening the pizza, handing me a piece. "Report it, to like... some council for TV-shows, I don't know," he suggested. "Is there even a thing like that?"

I shrugged, making a face and took a bite of the pizza. "You know what the weirdest thing is?" I asked as he was taking a bite. He shook his head with the pizza in his mouth. "I'm afraid she's going to start doing stuff with him. Like... going behind my back."

"That's crazy," Joey anticipated. "If she really loves you she won't cheat."

That really got me thinking. What if she actually didn't love me and she was creating this drama for even more publicity? I quickly realized that, that option was completely ridiculous. I knew she was with Cory right now, though. Lord knows what they were doing. I hoped she didn't fall for him, even though it might've been a bit ridiculous.

"I know," I agreed. "But I'm pretty sure Ryan hates me right now. I'm almost sure he's going to fire me."

"Why would he fire you? You're like perfect for that show," he flattered me. "You make the crazy fangirls all wet and shit."

I laughed a bit at his insane statement, and then made a serious gaze. "Well, Lea and I had sex in my dressing room," I said. Joey lifted his eyebrows as high as he could. "Stop looking like that. Anyways, we were taped, since Ryan put up cameras to avoid sex in the dressing rooms... Then we went to delete the video, but apparently they have a fucking backup folder. So, of course, Ryan called us in today to watch the video and drown in our agony over it."

"Wait, wait, wait. Did he watch it, with you?" Joey asked.

"Yes, until I asked him to turn it off, for Lea's sake," I said. "To be honest, I would love a copy of that tape, our sex was pretty hot."

"Oh my God, would you stop, you're grossing me out," Joey said and punched me lightly. I laughed. Joey always knew had to get me to smile again, after a shit day.

LEA'S POV:

I was in Cory's bathroom. Crying. I didn't know why the fuck I couldn't just be with Darren, when that was all I wanted. It's not like Cory loved being with me, either. He looked like he had more important things to do than hang around with his fake girlfriend, who was just wishing to be with her real boyfriend. I missed Darren more than ever right in this moment. I missed his cute words to me, I missed his smell, his looks... his _everything_. And apparently I was Cory's date for the Grammy's. I wanted to throw up, at the thought of not going with Darren. I walked into the living room, where Cory was sitting with his feet up on the table.

"I called Darren," he stated. I was surprised.

"Why?" I asked and sat down next to him. He looked at me.

"Because I can see how much you need him," he answered. I hugged him and kissed him on the cheek. Instantly there was a knock on the door. Cory went to open it and I stayed put on the couch. "Hi, guys."

When I heard him referring to, two men I looked up and saw Joey Richter behind Darren. I had never met him before, but Darren had talked about him. I got up from the couch and ran to Darren. I jumped into his arms and felt him kissing the top of my head.

"I've missed you," he whispered. I didn't say anything, because I knew, he knew I had missed him too. He let go of me and I kissed him on the mouth. I went to Joey and stuck out my hand.

"Lea," I said and smiled. Darren walked up behind me and kissed my ear as I shook hands with Joey.

"Joey," he said and smiled. "Darren has talked about you constantly today."

"Oh has he?" I said and turned around to look at Darren. Joey nodded and laughed. He went to say hi to Cory, and I knew Cory had met him before. I grabbed Darren's hand and sat in the couch with him. He kept kissing my cheek, and I tried to push him away, but he always ended up tickling me, causing me to laugh. This moment was sort of perfect.


	9. Chapter 9

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hi, I'm gonna update this story every Wednesday from now on, because I don't have the time to update it everyday like last week. Hope you're enjoying the story so far. Oh and Naya's boyfriend is fictional in this story. **

LEA'S POV:

Last night with Darren, Cory and Joey had actually been really nice. Of course I wanted to be alone with Darren, but any time I got with him at all, would do. Today we didn't have Glee, but a few us had an interview together - including Darren. I wasn't sure who else was going, but he definitely was. I hoped I'd get some time with him alone, but Ryan was going along and he'd probably make sure I stayed away from Darren all day. And he would probably also make sure, I'd talk a lot about Cory to the interviewer.

Right after I woke up I went to the bathroom and undressed myself to take a shower. As I stood in there feeling the hot water flow down my skin, I wished Darren could be here. Just standing in here with me, holding me. The last thing Darren had said to me, before he left me alone in the parking lot was that we needed to have a rerun of the sex in the dressing room. I had blushed and he had kissed me quickly on the cheek. It was weird, that we had to look out for paparazzi before even saying a word to each other, I'd surely never dreamt of having a relationship like that. How I wish Darren could just be Cory, so I could be seen with him.

I stepped out of the shower and dried my body with a big white towel. Afterwards I wrapped it around my hair and found new underwear. As I put my bra on, the landline rang. I went into the living room to pick it up.

"Hallo?" I said holding the phone with my shoulder to my ear, as I was trying to hook the bra.

"Hey, Lea," Naya's hoarse voice said in the other end of the line. "Do you mind picking me up, today?"

"Sure," I said finally hooking the bra and grabbing the phone to switch ear. "I thought Keegan was your ride though?"

"He was," she said and sighed. "Until we broke up this morning."

"Oh my God! What happened?" I shrieked. I heard her breathe heavily as if she was crying.

"We just had an argument about the future and stuff and... well it ended badly," she almost whispered into the phone.

"Well. I'll pick you up," I said trying to be happy, to encourage her to be happy too. She answered with a sad okay, and then we hung up. I went to my room, afterwards, to find out what to wear. I threw almost all my clothes on the floor, until I found a tank top and a high-waist skirt, that I knew I had a jacket to match, and wore that. After I was dressed I went back to the bathroom and let my hair out of the towel to dry it. It took a while, since I had quite a lot of hair.

I walked into the kitchen after I had decided that I was hungry. I threw a bread in the toaster and took out the butter, and buttered the bread when it was toasted. In the middle of the present silence, I heard three knocks on the door. I took the bread with me, as I went to the door to open.

"Oh my God. What the Hell are you doing here?" I said, but not in excitement as I saw it was Darren. "You know you can't be here!"

"You're my ride, that's pretty innocent, right?" he said as he entered the door. He went to me and kissed me hungrily. I closed the door as he did.

"Well... I guess, but Naya's coming too," I said and took a bite of the toast. Darren smiled his usual dapper smile.

"Yup, and Chris's coming too!" he was way too excited about something.

"What's up with you?"

"I'm just happy to be here, back in your apartment," he said and threw himself on the coach. Immediately, Pixie came running from my room. It was like she had a Darren-radar. "Hey girl, I've missed you!"

I stood for a minute smiling at Darren and Pixie in the couch, practically french kissing. He let her lick his nose and then he scratched her behind the ear, which she loved.

"By the way," Darren said and paused. "You look... _amazing_."

"Thank you, Darren. You do too," I said, not just being polite. He always looked amazing, but considering how much I'd missed him, he looked even better right now.

"Oh, my parents are coming to town this monday," he began. I crouched my eyebrows together, knowing I couldn't meet them. "I really want you to meet them."

I took his hands in mine and looked him in the eyes. "You know I want to," I began. "I just can't. We can't. It's a big risk to be seen, and people are going to think we're together, _especially _if I'm with you _and _your parents."

He nodded slowly. "I understand. But what if I brought them here?"

"Could you ever do that without being spotted?" I asked, skeptically. He shrugged. I gently shook my head. "I don't want the world to think I'm A) a cheater or B) a liar. That would ruin everything."

"We shouldn't be this afraid of Ryan," Darren growled letting go of my hands. Or more like pulling them out of mine. "This is fucking ridiculous!"

"Darren, calm down..." I began. He rushed off the couch.

"No, Lea! I can't calm down! This man practically _owns _you! And you know why? It's because you're letting him!" he screamed angrily. I got pretty heated myself, but tried to suppress it.

"No! Listen, I just don't want to lose everything I have, okay? He's went for something that could ruin my reputation. Imagine if I come out and say it's Ryan making me date Cory. People would either think I'm crazy or that Cory is abusive. _That's _what's ridiculous!" I yelled back at him. He looked surprised that I could yell this way.

"So you're saying that you care more about your reputation than you care about me?" he said. I could see in his wet eyes, that he was hurt. "Or would you just rather be with Cory? Is that it?"

"You are crazy! Of course not," I said and cupped his face, and looked at him; both of us crying. "I love you, so much. More than you could ever imagine, but I'm a perfectionist. I don't want to fuck anything up. I love my life, apart from this drama. I don't want it to change. So I'll wait."

"I love you too," he said so low, it was almost a whisper. "Can you just meet my parents anyway? I'll get them here, unnoticed."

"Okay," I surrendered. "Monday?"

"Monday," he agreed, and smiled, kissing me.

DARREN'S POV:

Lea had driven me, Naya and Chris to the interview where we met up with Jenna and Heather. Seven of us were doing the interview and where the rest were, I didn't know. I just knew that I had to sit and look at Lea and Cory being all... fake in love. It was grossing me out. I wanted to punch Cory, but I knew this wasn't his fault. And after all, he called me last night, because he could see Lea needed me. I should be kissing his feet.

We were all directed into a room filled with posters of different tv-shows. The Glee poster was of Dianna and Lea. A few moments later the interviewer came in and shook all of our hands.

"So," he began, "your show is a success among young people! What message do you really want to bring out with the series?"

"Well, I think that our message is mostly _be yourself_," Lea answered. We all nodded, agreeing with her.

"Also that you shouldn't be afraid to _tell _people who you are," Naya said, with a small grin.

"Yeah, _I _think it's really important for young people to feel like... they're wanted, y'know? And feel right no matter what, like, no matter if you're gay or straight or what you might be. I think it's very important to know that there's nothing wrong to be," I contributed. Again, everyone nodded in agreement.

Several questions later, I was quite tired, but we weren't done yet.

"So, we've asked some fans to send in some questions for you, and we've chosen one question for each," the interviewer said and took out the questions. He started with me. "Darren, the fans want to know if you're dating anyone."

I panicked. What was I supposed to say? Did Lea want me to say yes or no? I guess I'd always been pretty closed about my personal life so I was just going to keep up that facade.

"Well," I said smirking. "Even if I was, I wouldn't tell you."

Lea, who was holding Cory's hand, looked reliefed.


	10. Chapter 10

Darren's POV:

I woke up, feeling more tired than ever. I was a morning person, so I was usually up early and fresh, but this morning it felt like everything was just blurry and unimportant. I'd never felt this way before. I guess I could've just had a nightmare I couldn't remember, but I felt like it was something different. Like something bad was going to happen today. I rolled out of bed, slowly, and went to the kitchen. I looked through the fridge, but I didn't want any of it. I grabbed my iPhone on the counter and called the person I knew could help me in this state. Lauren Lopez.

"Hallo?" she said tiredly as she picked up the phone.

"It's Darren," I answered her. She sighed.

"Lucky for you; I'm already up. What's up?" she asked. I went to the fridge and got out a water bottle.

"I kind of need you, Lo. You're like... the only person who knows how to cheer me up properly. You need to help me," I said sounding depressed.

"I'll be right over," she said and hung up. I put the phone back on the counter and sat on the couch. I didn't even bother to turn on the TV. I had no idea what was happening to me. About fifteen minutes later, LoLo (The nickname we'd chosen for Lauren) barged through my door.

"Okay, hi. Are you in crisis? What is going on, Criss?" she said and threw her purse across the room. I stared intensely at her.

"I'm kind of guessing that Joey haven't talked to you," I asked, but before she could say anything I answered myself. "Of course not, he's a fucking girl about gossipping."

"Wait, what do you mean?"

"I'm dating someone. Um, Lea Michele," I said hesitating a bit. She looked surprised.

"Hold up. Is _that _the crisis?" she asked. I explained the whole Ryan-Lea-me-Cory-thing and she suddenly understood the crisis. "Wow, Ryan Murphy sure is a supercunt. Should we write a new musical about the superhero Supercunt?"

"I'd rather not," I said squeezing my eyes together. "But you go ahead, Lo."

"Okay, I can't stand to look at that depressing face, let's get you the Hell out of this apartment," she said grabbing me hand and pulling me off the couch. "Go get dressed!"

I ran to my room and got dressed as she wanted me to. When I went out again - dressed, she grabbed my wrist and my keys, and dragged me out of the apartment. She almost made me trip all the way down the stairs. Considering her size, she was quite strong.

"Now, I think you can walk yourself," she said and threw me my keys. "Get your car. I'm driving, by the way. You look like you're completely suicidal, and I don't want to die today."

I grinned at her, even though she was completely serious. Lauren was kind of... crazy. But she was one of the greatest friends in the world. I led her to my car and let her get in the driver's seat. I went shotgun.

"Um, where are you abducting me to?" I asked slowly. She laughed at my remark.

"The happiest place on earth."

"Ooooooh, no," I said, knowing what she was referring to. Chuck E. Cheese. "There are kids _everywhere._"

"Maybe you should be around some kids for a change," she said, with the sliest grin on her face.

"C'mon. People are going to think we're pedophiles if we don't have any kids along," I remarked.

"Well, Chuck E. Cheese is in the other direction," she said, still wearing her grin.

"Lo... are you going to kidnap a kid?"

"No! I'm going to get my niece first," she explained.

"She's like four."

"Four and a _half!_" she bit, then laughed. I rolled my eyes, as she parked. "Stay here."

I did as she said, and shortly after she came out with a child walking next to her. She put her in on the backseat. I smiled at her.

"I forgot her name," I said as Lauren sat in the driver's seat again.

"Mallory," Lauren said and smiled. "And Mallie is going with us to Chuck E. Cheese!"

Mallory started clapping in the back of the car. I smiled at her again. She reached for me and I gave her my hand. I think she tried to shake it, but it came of as a lot of random movements. Finally when Lauren parked the car, I went out and went to the backseat to get Mallory out. I carried her inside.

"You look very handsome carrying a kid," Lauren noticed. "Do you think you and Lea will ever get children?"

"I don't know," I said. "When the time's right. And when she's out of Ryan's evil grip."

"Evil," Mallie repeated. I smiled at her and nodded.

"Yeah, he's evil," I said smiling. "Can I teach her to say motherfucker?"

"Dotherpucker," Mallie repeated. Lauren looked strictly at me.

"No, Darren," she said, with a tiny smile. "My brother will murder me."

I was just laughing as we walked into the restaurant. When we got settled at a table, my phone begin to ring.

"Hallo?" I said as I picked it up.

"Hey..." Lea's voice said in the other end. She sounded sad.

"Lauren, I'll be right back," I said and got off the chair and walked away. "What's wrong?"

"I... I need to see you, I have something to say," she said in a low voice. "I can't tell you over the phone."

"Okay... Can you come to Chuck E. Cheese?" I asked. She paused.

"Sure," she said. "I'll be right there."

She hung up, so I went back to where Lo sat. "Uh, Lea's joining us."

"Great!"

"Don't sound too enthusiastic. Something's definitely up with her," I said. Lauren looked questioning at me. "She said she needed to tell me something, but she couldn't say it over the phone."

"Oh my God, that doesn't sound too good," Lauren said putting Mallory down. She walked to the ball pit. Lauren kept her eyes on her.

"What if she's going to break it off, because she's in love with Cory?" I said, and sat back down.

"Don't rush. You'll see when she gets here," she said and put her hand on mine. "It's going to be fine, okay?"

I nodded slowly. We sat for nine minutes and waited for Lea, until she came through the doors. I could see she'd been crying.

"Hi," I said and hurried to get up from my seat. She kissed me, on the cheek and made sure no one saw. She walked to Lauren.

"Hi, I'm Lea," she said, trying to smile, but almost failing.

"Lauren," she replied and smiled. Lea walked to me. She looked at me for a while, gathering courage, I guess.

"I'm... I'm pregnant," Lea whispered. I was in complete shock. It was like a 200 volt wire had just been connected to me and turned on. I felt totally numb, and didn't know what to respond. I was afraid that if I opened my mouth, in an attempt to speak, nothing other than: I, u uh would come out.

"W-w-what?" I stuttered. A tear ran from her eye.

"You heard me," she said hoarsely.

"Are... are you, um. Sure?" I stuttered. She nodded. I pulled her in for a hug. _We're so screwed, _I thought.


	11. Chapter 11

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: If this chapter seems a bit rushed, it's because I somehow convinced myself that I updated on Thursdays instead of Wednesdays. Forgive me. But I hope it's going to be a bit interesting. I'm not gonna make a lot of drama in this chapter, but there'll be some small things :) Btw, I might make Ryan a bit... crazy. Like... ready for the coo-coo's nest. Or like some sort of ... glee-dictator. lol. **

****LEA'S POV:

After I'd told Darren that I was pregnant, he'd taken me to the ladies' room to talk about it. He didn't want Lauren to hear it. He looked so confused, and this thing definitely wasn't positive for either one of us.

"So... what are we going to do about... this, um... _situation_?" he asked, stuttering his way through. He kept scratching his neck; it was obvious that he was nervous. I could almost hear his heartbeat, from the few inches away, that I stood.

"I don't want to not have it," I said, not letting myself say the word "abortion". It seemed wrong for me to say, somehow. "I do want this baby, but I want to be able to raise it with _you. _Not Cory."

He slowly nodded, looking distant. "I, um, I understand. If we tell Ryan, do you think he'll... make you say it's Cory's?" he said, glazed in sweat, almost panting for air. I kind of regretted telling him, since it was worrying him this much.

"He can't do that," I said, doubting it a bit. If he could force me to date a person, I didn't love, why couldn't he make me do other things then? What if he was... like insane or something? "I guess we'd sue him, or something like that."

"So, wait... we're just going to march up to him and tell him... _this_?" Darren asked, more back to normal now. I pressed my eyebrows together, and slowly nodded.

"Wouldn't that be better than to just lie about the whole thing? Like keep it secret," I explained. He nodded, but still looking distant. He pulled me in for a hug, and as always I felt home in his arms. I closed my eyes and started to imagine a family with him. How we could be married and have two or three kids run around on a beautifully mowed lawn, with water guns, and me and Darren lying on a couch on the porch, which we'd have. I'd always imagined myself, ending up like that, in a suburb with a husband and a few kids. Now that husband just had a face. But like always someone had to try and take my dreams away from me, in this case Ryan. But... all my dreams had always come true. And I was destined to make this happen. Darren slowly let go of me and kissed me forehead. I smiled at him, letting one tear slip out and slide down my cheek. He wiped it away with his index finger, and took my hand.

"No matter what, I'll be here, okay?" he whispered. I nodded, now feeling distant myself. We went out of the bathroom together.

"Are you okay?" Lauren said when we reached the table. We both nodded, but knew we looked startled due to all this. She nodded at our replies, and invited us to sit down. "So you're _the _Lea Michele."

"Guess I am," I replied and tried to smile. Lauren grabbed a cup filled with cola and poured it in her mouth.

"I've heard a lot about you," she said and smirked at Darren. "Not from him, though. He never, freaking, opens his mouth and talks."

We laughed together before I said: "Well, it's not like that with me," and grabbed his hand. Lauren smiled.

"I guess you're the one who cracked him open," she said, not taking her eyes off him for one second. He looked back at her, but then at me. "He's sort of... a closed person."

She was talking about him like he wasn't even here. "Aw, I wouldn't say that, Lo. Who called you this morning?" he spat back, and smirked. She laughed.

"Well, who had to get a can opener, to open you up to me? I almost had to punch you to get you to tell me what the issue was," she laughed on. She was like a... permanently drunk girl. I smiled at their little "fight" and took some of Darren's diet coke. In the middle of the fun-talk, my phone rang. I picked it up without looking at the number.

"Hello?" I asked, and then looking and Dare and Lauren. "Excuse me."

"Ryan wants to talk to us," Cory's voice said. It was so deep that I almost got a shock.

"About what?" I said, skeptically.

"I don't know, he didn't say. You should come fast, though... He didn't seem happy," Cory said. I could hear he was in his car.

"When does he ever?" I said low-keyed. "I'll be there as fast as I can."

I hang up without letting him know, and then went back to Darren and Lauren at the table who was discussing something about a superhero, which I didn't understand, since I wasn't into that. I cleared my throat, which made them both look at me.

"I have to go," I said, and kissed Darren on the cheek, and then went to Lauren and shook her hand. "I'll see you around."

"Bye," they said in unison. Though Darren's mouth showed a big smile, his eyes were sad, and wondering. Probably wondering why I ditched so fast. I bet he also would've liked to talk the pregnancy thing over. It was definitely left unsolved. I entered my car and sat for a moment before I turned on the motor and hit the speeder. I had turned on the radio, because music, right now, would make me frustrated. I was scared, I had to admit that. Knowing that there was life inside of your body, was a very scary feeling. I wanted that baby, and if that meant quitting Glee... then I guess I'd have to do that. I'd rather have a new dream realized, than to keep an old dream, that had already come true, going. I parked in FOX's parking lot, checked myself in the mirror and then headed for Ryan's office. Cory was already sitting in the chair across from Ryan, biting his nails.

"Miss Michele," Ryan said. He was disgusting, sitting in that chair, having the power of my life. "Glad you came."

"Hi," I snapped. "What's this about?"

"Well, according to a lot of tweets, I can understand that you've been spotted, _kissing _Darren," he said. His eyes were looking very friendly. "I am very sorry, but I thought we all understood what I said. You cannot be seen with him! You are with Cory, Darren is just a co-worker to you. _Co-worker. _Nothing. Else."

"How can I pretend like he doesn't exist!" I yelled. Cory looked at me with a look that asked me to calm down, but I couldn't.

"It's easy, you do it for a living. Act," he claimed. I sighed as loud as I possibly could.

"You're ridiculous, I hope you know that," I said through my gritted teeth. "Actually no, you're pure evil. Do you not know what it's like to love someone?"

"Miss Michele, I would recommend you quieted now," he said angrily. I shook my head, with a crazed smile.

"No, I won't keep quiet," I snapped. "This is going to come right back and bite you in the ass, and that day is going to be soon."

"Mr. Monteith, please leave this room," Ryan said, causing Cory to get up and walk out, slamming the door behind him. "Not only are you going to be fired. I'm going to make stuff happen to you. Or Darren."

"Are you threatening us?"

"I'm just... warning," he said coldly. He was starting to scare me. He couldn't hurt me... could he? "Someone will disappear, quickly, if they don't listen to what I'm ordering them to do. That clear?"

I nodded, and swallowed and lump in my throat. I turned around and went out of the door. Normally I would've called Darren, but I was afraid Ryan would actually do what he said he would. But honestly... how important could one show be? Was Glee so important to him, that he would hurt people to make it number one? Maybe he was really insane.

DARREN'S POV:

Lauren and I had dropped off Mallie and went back to my apartment together. When we'd finally climbed all the stairs, we dumped our tired bodies on the couch. I tried to call Lea, but there was no reply. I got worried about her instantly. But then a voicemail flew in, and I called to check it.

"Darren, hi. I just talked to Ryan. He, uh, he threatened us. Both. I'm afraid he'll actually act, so I think we should take some time apart. Only see each other when we're certain no one can see. I don't want either of us to get hurt. I love you so much. Bye," Lea's voice said. A tone declared the message over and I sat on the couch with tears in my eyes.

"What's wrong?" Lauren asked worriedly when she saw me. I handed her the phone and she listened to the message. "Oh my God."

"He threatened her!" I yelled with tears running down my cheeks. "That crazy son of a bitch!"

I jumped off the couch and went back and forth behind the couch. Lauren walked to me and put her arms around me. I cried, feeling her shirt get wet from my tears. "He can't do this," she comforted. "It's words. He's just... mentally fucked up."

"Other people has hurt humans for less than a TV show. I'm afraid he might do something," I cried. She hugged me tighter. Could Lea and I ever get a proper relationship or were we destined for this..?


	12. Chapter 12

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: This might be one of the last chapters to not jump a month ahead or something. I want to write about the whole pregnancy, but not day by day. I hope this won't be too boring (: **

DARREN'S POV:

I wandered through the halls of Joey and Brian's apartment. I finally reached their door and knocked hardly on it. Brian opened the door and raised his eyebrows highly, when he saw it was me.

"Darren!" he exclaimed excitedly and hugged me. "Come on in."

I stepped over the threshold, and walked in to dump myself at the bar, they'd placed in the kitchen. Their apartment was huge. They had a lot of different things, but my favorites were the bar and the fussball table.

"Do you need a drink? You look... beat," Brian commented. I just nodded. I had absolutely no words. Brian didn't even know that I was with Lea and after Ryan had threatened her I was afraid I had mics on me or something. But I figured Ryan wasn't that crazy, and it was just me being paranoid.

"I'm... just done," I mumbled. He looked worriedly at me, and sat down beside me. He swung two beers up on the disk and opened them. I emptied it in a matter of seconds, where he was slower.

"Talk to me," he said and took a sip of his beer. I shook my head, trying to think. I didn't know what to say. So I just tried my best instead of thinking it thoroughly over.

"Lea's pregnant," I said simply, expecting all the questions.

He looked confused, like he didn't know why that was my problem. "With Cory?" he asked and sipped his beer once more.

I shook my head. "With me."

"Wait, she cheated?" he asked again. I shook my head in response.

"She's not dating him, she's dating me. But Ryan fucking Murphy is a fucking insane bastard. He wants Lea and Cory to date for publicity and yesterday he threatened Lea," I said and grabbed a beer, myself this time. I sipped it in seconds, too. Brian looked like he'd gotten filled with too much information at one time.

"So... basically you two are screwed?" he asked. I nodded. "Why did he threaten her?"

"Because he's afraid that she'll ditch Cory and run off with me. He apparently thinks that _'Monchele' _will make Glee the best show in the world," I sighed. I got tears in my eyes from talking about it. Brian and I stayed in the kitchen for a while, drinking until I was drunk. Like really drunk. Of course, I decided to call People's Magazine and tell them the whole thing. The funny thing is that I told the entire story with no mistakes, and you almost couldn't hear that I was drunk. The next morning I woke up on Brian's couch with a blanket on top of me. I looked at my phone and saw that I three missing calls from Lea. I dialed her number.

"Hallo?" she answered.

"Hi, it's me," I said, groggily. I was so hungover.

"Darren. Do you have any idea what you've done?" she said, hurt in her voice. I could almost hear the tear falling from the corner of her eye.

"What are you talking about?" I asked, scratching my neck. I felt my heart break in two when I heard her voice.

"People's Magazine," she said quietly. I slowly remembered the day before. _Shit, shit, shit! _

"Oh my God! I'm so sorry, I wasn't thinking," I tried to explain, but the quiet sounds of her sobs stopped me. "Come to Brian and Joey's apartment. Be with me."

"I don't know," she hesitated. "It'll get discovered."

"I don't care anymore," I said emotionless. "It's not like I can actually feel anything anymore."

"What?" she whimpered. I sighed and ran my fingers through my unwashed, greasy hair. She breathed heavily in the other end of the line. It took me a while to think of what to respond.

"This hurts, Lea. It's hurt me so much that I don't actually know if I hurt anymore," I tried to explain. "I love you, though. _That _I can feel."

"I'm coming over. You need me, I can hear that," she said, simply.

"I need you more than ever," I responded and scratched my scrub, that had begun to grow, really fast. We both hung up with no more words. I texted her the address and in no less than ten minutes she was at the front door. When she saw me, her face lit up like a kid's on christmas morning. She wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me, passionately. She kissed me with the kind of passion people kissed with then they knew they were never going to see that person again.

"Hi," she whispered against my lips, after she'd slowly broken the kiss. I smiled, leaning my lips on hers.

"Hey," I whispered back, as I ran my hands through her soft hair. She felt my hair, in return remarking that it was greasy. I laughed and spun her around. When I put her down again, I looked her in the eye. "Can we talk about the pregnancy thing?"

"If you're ready... I mean yesterday you weren't exactly... well, you were distant," she said and hung her jacket on a rack. We went to the couch and sat down. "In third month, we're announcing at Ellen that this is your baby."

"So you made a plan?" I asked, with a smirk. She playfully hit me.

"You know I like to be organized. But yes," she said. "I'm not afraid of Ryan, he's just saying this... I will, however, admit that he's absolutely fucking crazy."

I loved when she swore. It was not something, that she did a lot, but when it happened, I just had to giggle at how cute she was.

"He's crazy for even saying that he wants to hurt one of us. But we'll get through this unbruised," I said. She nodded, and leant her arm on the back of the couch.

"But however, I do want you to stay with me during this pregnancy. After all, you _are _the father and it's something about the baby feels more comfortable about the dad when it gets older if he's there during the pregnancy," she mumbled disoriented. "I want you to come to every single Lamaze class with me, and I don't want you to miss one single doctor's appointment."

"I promise I won't. You heard me say that I've always wanted to be a dad, and do you know just how much I love you for actually making that happen?" I asked and poked her nose. She just smiled, and laid her hand on my thigh.

"I love you too, daddy Darren," she said, smirking.

"Oh my God, that sounds like I'm a pimp," I said, laughing. She broke into an uncontrollable laughter that didn't stop until a minute has passed.

She dried her eyes, that had let a few tears slip out from all the laughter. "You don't have any idea, how much of an amazing daddy you're going to be," she said, cupped my face and looked me in the eyes, smiling.


	13. Chapter 13

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: I'm aware that it's not wednesday, but I read a few of the reviews and some twitter messages saying that I needed to update more and make the chapters longer. So I'm gonna post as often as I can, but I don't do it in the week, Wednesday's my deadline. (: p.s. Lounge is an interview-thingy in my country so I just used that. **

****LEA'S POV:

After Darren and I had talked the situation over, Brian Holden, who lived in the apartment Darren was in, woke up and walked into the living room.

"You're Lea," he said, smiling a tired smile. His hair was crumbled, and his face was pale, probably because he'd just woken up. I nodded, and got up to shake his hand.

"And you're Brian. I wish I could say I heard all about you, but I just heard that you own the apartment," I giggled. He let out a tiny laugh, and scratched his hair.

"Yeah, well... there's not so much to know about me," he said, and marched to the kitchen. "I'm a complete goober, like your boyfriend, though."

Darren smiled and walked over to hold my hand. He pointed at Brian. "I'm not a goober," he joked. Brian just laughed and took out some yoghurt.

"Do you guys want any?" he asked, shaking the yoghurt in front of us. I shook my head, and let go of Darren's hand.

"No, I have to be somewhere in..." I looked at my watch, "twenty minutes."

"Where do you have to be?" Darren asked me, pushing his eyebrows together.

"With Cory," I replied slowly. I could see the hurt on Darren's face, and I could feel how awkward Brian felt, standing in the middle of this. I'm guessing that Dare told him about the situation. "Listen, we're doing this interview, but Naya's coming too!"

He stared at me, like I'd told him I had cancer. "Please don't look at me like that," I whimpered and grabbed his hands.

"No, no. It's okay. Just try to stay... away from him," He said. I pulled him in for a hug, and then turned to shake Brians hand.

"Darren, I promise I won't do anything with him, that I wouldn't do with anyone else. And Brian, so nice to meet you," I said, grabbed my purse and went out of the door. I rushed down the halls, knowing that I was probably already late. I checked out my reflection in apartment door, to see if I needed to go home and put some makeup on before I went to the interview rooms. I figured I looked fine, so I went to my car and started heading towards the rooms. When I arrived Cory was waiting at the parking lot. I went out of the car and waved at him.

"Hi," he said, when I reached him. I greeted back. "I should probably wrap my arms around your waist."

"Yeah, do that," I said, letting him wrap them around me. We walked in towards the room, which we were going to be interviewed in. Naya was already in there, waiting for us.

"Hey guys!" Naya said, and jumped off the couch to hug us both. "You look so cute! How are you?"

We mumbled something inaudible, which made Naya press her eyebrows up against each other. She slowly nodded and sat down on the couch with us next to her. Moments later, the female interviewer and a camera man entered the door.

"Hi, I'm Ashley Combs," she said and shook all of our hands. We didn't introduce ourselves since she probably knew who she was interviewing. "The first thing I want you to do, is say you're name and tell what the viewer's watching."

The camera man set up the camera and started it, focusing on all three of us. "Hi I'm Naya Rivera," Naya said looking at me.

"I'm Lea Michele," I said and smiled. I smiled genuinely. I loved being interviewed, I just wished Darren could be here.

"And I'm Cory Monteith," Cory said smiling at laying a hand on my thigh, which made me quite uncomfortable.

"And you're watching Lounge," we all said in unison. The interviewer did something with her hand and the camera man turned off the camera.

"Thank you," Ashley said smiling. Five minutes went by with her reading the questions to herself, and then she cued the camera man to film again. "So how is it to be back on set on season _four _again?"

Naya and Cory both looked at me and hoped for me to answer first. "I love it," I said. "I mean, I've missed everyone on set, and it was so amazing to see them all again."

"Yeah, we had like a moment where we all ran down the halls, screaming, 'cause it was so amazing to see each other on work again," Naya said and laughed. We laughed along, and I felt like Cory's hand slipped more up my thigh.

"I heard you and Heather Morris spent a lot of time together, while you were on hiatus," she said directed to Naya. While Naya told about her and Heather, a message came on my phone from Darren.

_"Hi, Lee. You still need to meet my parents one of these days. I know we said Monday, but that was yesterday and I didn't call them. I can have them here by Friday?" _it said.

I responded quickly that friday would do. Ashley now looked at me, about to ask a question.

"I've been told that you two are pretty honest about your relationship, is that true?" she referred to both Cory and I. He knew he had to answer the question.

"We're pretty open about it, yes," he answered, smiled and grabbed my hand.

"How is she?"

"She's amazing. She's the kind of person, you could spend all your time with and never get tired of. She's the kind of person who shows her affection, by fighting for the person she loves. If she loves you, you won't doubt it," he said not taking his eyes off me for one second. I smiled at Cory, and hoped he was kind of referring to Darren when he said all that. Like, he was talking about what Darren had.

"And how is _he?_" Ashley asked, smirking. I smiled.

"Well, he's my best friend. I love him. He knows me so well, and understands me. He's supportive of everything I do, and I know that no matter what he'll be there for me. He's amazing, and he's definitely worth loving," I said thinking about this whole Ryan thing. I especially thought about the day he called Darren over because he could tell I missed him like crazy. I was serious when I said that I loved him... I just didn't love him like I loved Darren. The rest of the interview went by with the normal questions, followed by a round of Never Have I Ever. After the interview we went to the hallway, to say goodbye.

"Thank you," Cory said as he hugged me.

"For what?" I said, grinning. He shrugged.

"For everything you said about me," he answered, smiling. There was a moment of silence before he talked again. "So I'm guessing you're going to see Darren now?"

"No, I'm not. I'm just going home," I said and straightened my hair out, and put my bag on my shoulder.

"Well, do want to grab some coffee or something?" he asked. I chewed the inside of my cheek as I thought about it.

Finally I came to a conclusion. "Yeah. I'd love that," I said and grabbed his hand. We went to his car and drove to the nearest Starbucks. We sat down at a table outside and waited for a waitress to come by our table. Finally one rolled past.

"Oh my God! You're from Glee," she remarked. We both nodded, wearing a small grin. "What can I get for you?"

"Just a small latté," I answered and looked to Cory, who was in great thinking.

"Coffee. Black," he said. She wrote it down on her pad, and nodded. Then she trailed off, leaving us alone again.

"Wow, coffee... black," I repeated. "You normally take a frappucino..."

"Yeah, but I feel like I could use some caffein, for a change. It's been a long and stressful day," he explained, as he picked up his phone to look at it. "Mark's called."

"Call him back," I said and giggled. He did as I said, and put the phone to his ear. I didn't listen to Cory's conversation. Instead I pulled up my phone and looked for any texts. There were three new ones. I opened the first one.

_"Okay, all done. My parents are coming this Friday and staying until Sunday." _the text from Darren said. I didn't answer, because I figured I could just talk about that when I saw him again. The next text was just one from Dianna, telling me how cute Cory and I looked together in the interview. The third was from my mom.

"_Lea, the whole world knows your boyfriend before I do. Dad and I are staying for dinner tonight. Bring your boyfriend xx." _I gulped once, and felt my heartbeat get faster by the second. I didn't want my mom to think I was dating a person that I wasn't dating. But I guess I had to. At least up until third month of the pregnancy, where I would announce it was Darren's baby. I just didn't want to have my mom believe something, and be excited about it for so long when it was just all a lie. Finally Cory hung up the phone and looked at me.

"Something wrong? You look pale," he said and touched my arm lightly. I snapped back to reality and looked at him. I didn't say anything in a few seconds.

"Yeah, I'm fine. It's just... my mom wants to meet you," I explained, showing him the text. I pulled my phone away and looked at Cory.

"This can't end well," he said, simply. The waitress arrived with our drinks and placed them on the table.

"One frappucino and one latté, right?" she asked. We both nodded. She smiled and walked away again. I drank some of the latté, but it was burning hot.

"I can't lie to my mom about you," I said. He drank some of his frappucino, which luckily for him was cold. "I want her to know that I'm actually with Darren."

Cory nodded, slowly. "Yeah, I can understand that. By the way, how's Darren taking this situation?" he asked, talking about the whole Ryan-Cory-me thing.

"Pretty cool. All of his friends know that he and I are actually together," I said and tried to sip my latté again. It'd cooled down a bit.

"That's good, I guess," he said and held his cup tightly. I nodded.

"But what about your parents, do they know?" I asked, sipping once more.

"Ryan kind of told me, that I had to tell them I was with you," he said looking at the table.

Shit.


	14. Chapter 14

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: So, I'm updating a bit much today, but I had the idea for the dialogue. In the next chapter Lea and Darren get really romantic and we meet Darren's parents. I'm gonna post that around Saturday I think. But anyways, I hope you don't get to bored with all this, since there had to be a little bit of this. I'm still trying to make Ryan completely crazy. I'm not gonna make him a killer though ;) But if you've got anything you want in the story, feel free to give me a review saying it :) **

LEA'S POV:

Cory and I had gone home, together from Starbucks, since my parents had invited themselves over for dinner. Darren didn't know anything, and I just really wanted it to stay that way. He'd probably freak over me letting my parents meet Cory, and introduce _him _as my boyfriend.

"So what do you want for dinner?" I asked Cory, who shrugged in response. "What about homemade lasagna?"

He nodded, smiling, but then his face turned curious. "I didn't know you could cook," he said, smirking. That reminded me of the morning Darren made me eggs, and then I remembered that he still owed me a night of homemade cooking.

"My mom taught me to make all kinds of dishes," I answered as I washed my hands in the kitchen sink. "Lasagna's the one she and I made the most."

"All _my _mom taught me, was how to call the pizza parlor, and have them deliver," he laughed. I smiled at him, letting him wash his hands in the sink. I began to take out the different things, which was needed for lasagna. I didn't feel like making a tomato-sauce from scratch so I just grabbed some in a can, from the cabinet. I poured it into a bowl and spiced it with garlic and tomato paste.

"Cor, would you grab the meat from the fridge?" I asked him. He nodded and walked to the fridge to take out the meat. He opened the pack and laid it on a chopping board. I went to the cabinet and grabbed a pot to lightly fry the meat. After about twenty minutes we put the lasagna in the oven.

"Do you have any beers?" he asked me. I nodded and pointed to the fridge. He grabbed two beers.

"Oh no, I can't drink beer," it slipped out of me. I cursed under my breath, because he didn't know that I was pregnant. He put it back, but didn't take his eyes off me.

"Why _can't _you drink beer?" he asked, suspiciously. I sighed heavily and sat down. "Are you pregnant?"

I nodded slowly, with closed eyes. "Oh my God," he said. I felt him sit down next to me and put his arms around me. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. Darren and I have it all planned out," I answered. He lifted one eyebrow. "We're going to tell the world that it's his."

"But it _is _his, right?" he asked me. I nodded eagerly.

"Of course it is! But everyone thinks you and I are together. In third month, that's going to change," I explained. Cory opened his beer and took a big sip.

"What about Ryan? Does he know?"

"Nope. He actually threatened me the other day, so I don't think that right now's a good time to tell him," I said, emotionless. Cory stared at me, moping.

"Did he _threaten _you!" he almost screamed. His voice got so high pitched, I felt like my ears started bleeding.

"Well, I don't think it's something we should worry about. He's not _that _crazy," I defended. It felt wrong defending a crazy bastard like him, but I didn't want to end up in lawsuit for accusing somebody for something they didn't do.

"Sure, and you didn't think Norman Bates was _that _crazy, either!" Cory yelled referring to the movie Psycho. Maybe he was right. In the movie, Norman was... or seemed like a peaceful man, but he was a mentally disturbed, crazy killer. I'm sure Ryan wasn't able to kill anyone though. But I didn't want any violence performed on me, in any way. "I think you should go to somebody with this."

"I don't want to accuse him, when he hasn't done anything, but say something he probably regrets," I said. I seemed so naïve sometimes that I couldn't even stand myself.

"I don't think he regrets it," Cory mumbled. "Just promise me you'll act on it, if anything ever happens again?"

"I promise," I said. He held up his pinky in front of my face. I wrapped my pinky finger in his and we pinky promised. It was something I'd always done with all of my friends, and people just knew they could trust me, if they'd pinky promised with me. After a few minutes of silence, the doorbell rang. Cory, being the gentleman he was, went to the door to open it.

"Hi!" my mom screeched excitedly. "You must be Cory! I'm Edith."

They shook hands, and my mom went by Cory afterwards, to hug me. Meanwhile, my dad and Cory said hello to each other.

"Hi sweetie! I've missed you," my mom said and hugged me tightly.

"I've missed you too, mom," I said, as she let go of me. She went to the kitchen and looked into the oven.

"Looks delicious, honey," my mom, remarked about the lasagna. "Homemade, I assume?"

"Of course," I grinned. "Cory, honey, would you help me over here?"

Cory came rushing to me, right away. "Would you grab the lasagna and put it on the table?" I asked him. He nodded and found some ovenmits, so he could get out the lasagna. He walked quickly to the dining table, and put it down as fast as he could. I smiled at him, while getting out plates. My dad walked towards me after I'd gotten the plates on the table.

"Hi honey, you look wonderful," he said as he hugged me. "Almost glowing."

I couldn't help but laugh a bit at his remark. People always said that women had this special glow when they were pregnant. But to be honest, I would think Ryan would've beaten the entire glow out of me.

"Thank you, dad," I said and kissed him on the cheek. "Oh and guys, sit down please."

The evening went by fast, and mom and dad loved Cory. I wondered if they would've liked Darren. Then I thought that if they loved Cory, they would worship Darren. The entire night I kept seeing Darren in the seat next to me, instead of Cory. I wished for Darren to be there so badly, I almost frightened myself. My mom and dad were about to go home, so Cory gave them their coats.

"Thank you, both, for such a lovely dinner," my mom said and kissed my cheek. I pecked her lightly, and send her on to Cory.

"Lea, it was delicious," my dad commented. "We taught you something, eh?"

I laughed quietly. "Of course you did!" I said and kissed him on the cheek. Cory opened the door for them, and as we said our last goodbyes, they went out of the door.

"Well," Cory said and sighed. "I've got to be going too."

"I'll see you tomorrow at set," I said and hugged him. "And thank you for today."

"No problem, there's nothing to thank me for," he said. "Your parents were so nice."

"But it was a tough evening for me. Darren wasn't here, y'know," I said and sighed.

"I understand," he said in a low voice. "I'll see you."

He let himself out, and I was left alone in my apartment. I decided to go to sleep since we had an early day on set the next day. I woke up at six AM, sharp, and I had to be in at eight. I spent twenty minutes on doing makeup and hair, and after that I ate breakfast and watched television. Suddenly I heard the loud sound of my ringtone, signaling that it was Dianna. We'd picked a custom ringtone for her.

"Hey, Di," I said, holding the phone with my ear, leaning it on my shoulder.

"Hey Lee. Do you need a lift to set today?" she asked me.

"Sure, I could use a ride," I answered her.

"Awesome. I'll pick you up at seven thirty," she said. "Bye."

When we hung up, I realized how alone I felt in the moment. It was terribly random for the feeling to come rushing in now, but it did. And I realized how much of a pushover I was for just letting Ryan manipulate with my relationship. It wasn't okay, to do this to your employees. It had to be harder for Darren, than for me, though. He had to watch me with another man, pretending to be in love with him, when I was clearly not. I'd never experienced love like I did when I was with Darren, and that was not a feeling that was going to pass any time soon. When I looked into his eyes, I literally felt home. I felt myself falling apart when I couldn't see him. If I had to talk in metaphors, I could say that I was a piece of paper and Ryan was crumbling me, until I was a perfectly crumbled round ball... and then he would throw me in the trash. At 7:30 Dianna buzzed my doorbell and I ran down the stairs to her.

"Hey," I said, as I entered her car, and sat in the shotgun seat. She was already in her Quinn outfit. I was going to change on set. When we arrived, everyone was in the parking lot. We slowly went out of the car, and Dianna asked Kevin what was going on.

"Ryan and Darren are yelling at each other," Kevin said and pointed to a container a mile or so away from where we all stood. I ran, as fast I could, to them.

"What the Hell are you two doing?" I yelled at them. They stopped fighting and looked at me. "You want everything to not be suspicious, right? Then don't stand behind a container, and fight with Darren."

"Lea, stay out of this," Darren said, laying a hand on my shoulder. I was staring at Ryan with angry eyes.

"No, Darren! It's time someone does something about this. I've done everything you've asked me to, why don't you leave us alone?" I asked, yelling. Ryan looked stunned at me.

"Darren told me, that you're pregnant," he just replied. I was completely frozen. It felt like something had electrocuted me, on the highest volt. "Actually, I should say that I overheard him tell one of his friends."

"Who'd you tell?" I stuttered, looking at Darren. He grabbed my hand.

"Meredith," he replied. Ryan looked angrily at us both, shifting from me to Darren and from Darren to me.

"I am sorry, but I thought we had an agreement," Ryan hissed. "And I thought I made the consequences very clear."

"Don't you fucking dare threatening her!" Darren yelled. I put my hand on his shoulder, in attempt of calming him down. "Why are you doing this? Is it fun? 'Cause I sure as Hell don't see the fun in this!"

"Darren, stop," I whimpered and let go of his shoulder. I dropped my arms down my side. "If I have to quit for this to stop, then I will."

"I thought you were understanding that the consequences will happen if you don't follow my orders, and if you quit. You signed a contract a while ago. You _can't _quit," Ryan said, with no sign of emotions on his face. I felt sick to my stomach.

"You're a disgusting man," I said, turned my back on both of them and walked away. I walked straight past all the cast members staring me down. I heard footsteps right behind me that sounded quicker than walking.

"Lea, hold up!" Darren yelled, when I reached the choir room. I stopped and turned around. "I know this is difficult, but we need to do what he says, and then there'll come a day, soon enough, where we'll be free again."

"Do you think it's fun for me having to look at Cory and wishing you were there? Because it's not, it's really, really not," I said with tears in my eyes. Darren held my hand, but I pulled away. "I have your baby inside of me, but I'm pretty sure that soon the world is going to think that baby is Cory's. Ryan's fucking crazy. And I'm afraid what he'll do to us. Both of us."

"He. Can't. Hurt. Us," Darren said, slowly through his gritted teeth. I smiled sadly.

"But he can. In reality, everyone can hurt us," I said. "He's just number one."

"I love you... so much. I'm not going to let this get between us," Darren said. "I have an idea. Just listen... We'll tell Ryan we broke up, and you'll pretend like you're _actually _with Cory."

I guess my facial expression must've looked like I was thinking about his idea, because he stopped. "Don't. I know you hate it, but just hear me out. After a while, you and Cory will break up and you'll come back to me," he explained. His idea didn't seem terrible; I just didn't want to live without Darren for a long while.

"I guess I could do that," I said, slowly and quietly. "But we can still see each other, meanwhile, right?"

He just nodded and wrapped his arms around me. "I love you."


	15. Chapter 15

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: So yeah... no drama in this chapter, just fluffy, romantic stuff. I hope you liked it. (:**

DARREN'S POV:

Even though Lea and I had agreed to stay away from each other for a while, it was still planned that Lea was going to meet my parents, and today was Friday. I figured I'd cook, myself for tonight since I'd promised Lea that she would taste it someday. And no day could be better than today. I wouldn't do a big feast, but I'd make something that was exciting. I decided I'd call Lea first, so I picked up my phone and dialed her.

"Hallo?" she answered, in a sweet voice.

"Hey, Lee, it's me," I said, smiling.

"Hi, Dare," she said. I could hear the smile in her voice.

"I was thinking... why don't you come over and help me cook?" I asked, biting my lip.

"I'd love that," she replied. "I'll be there in ten minutes."

I started to prepare the meat, I was going to use for the dinner later. I washed it and cut off the fat. When I was done I sat on the couch to wait for Lea. After watching "Here Comes Honey Boo Boo" for about nine minutes, the doorbell buzzed. I knew it'd be Lea, so I buzzed her in immediately. I waited at my door for her to come up the stairs. At first I thought she was another person, because she was in a blonde wig, and had giant sunglasses.

"Hi," she said and hugged me. I kissed her on the cheek.

"Hi," I said and laughed a bit over her stupid costume. She was wearing a long jacket and boots, plus the wig and sunglasses.

"I was thinking that I could get ready here," she said and took off her sunglasses and wig. "And take a shower."

She dropped her jacket on the floor to reveal her naked body. I instantly felt my penis burn in my pants from looking at her. She slowly walked over to me, being seductive.

"Can I join you?" I stuttered. She bit her lip and nodded. She walked closer to me, until I could feel her breath on my chin. She pulled my t-shirt over my head, and kissed my neck, all the way to the bathroom. She unbuckled my pants, so they automatically fell off. I stepped out of them and kissed from Lea's mouth all the way down to her collarbones. I turned on the water tab, to fill the tub. She pulled off my boxers while she kissed all over my body. After the tub had filled she slowly crawled in, first and waited for me to come down and join her. I slowly crawled in and let her sit between my legs. I rubbed her back in little circles and kissed her on her neck. We bathed for a long time, probably around an hour, since it was so relaxing. When we got up from the bath Lea asked me to blow-dry her hair.

"Your hair's so soft," I said leaning my face on her shoulder, after her hair had dried.

"So is yours," she whispered, feeling my hair. "And you have a lot of little adorable curls."

I grinned and moved my head from her shoulder. She was staring into the mirror.

"Y'know," she began, "sometimes I hate what I see in the mirror."

I was shocked at her words. I didn't understand why such a beautiful woman could ever hate what she saw in the mirror. Especially not Lea.

"Why is that?" I asked, and played with her hair.

"Because of what's inside of the person staring back at me. The mistakes I've made," she explained. I placed a kiss on her shoulder.

"They don't define you," I whispered against her ear. She turned around to look at me.

"I know. But you can't tell me that the mistakes you've made, make you proud," she said, and closed her eyes when she was done talking.

"I'm not proud of them, I just don't care about them. They're in the past," I replied, grabbing her hand.

"This," she said and pointed to her stomach, talking about the baby, "is now."

"And it's not a _mistake,_" I said. "It was just love."

She nodded and walked out of the bathroom. I followed her. She walked straight to her bag and took out a dress, and some underwear. She slowly put it on.

"Do you like the dress?" she asked me, smiling. She spun around before me and grinned a bit. I felt awkward somehow, standing naked in my living room.

"I _love _it," I said. "I need to put on some clothing as well."

I began to walk out of the room, and I heard her pick stuff up from her bag.

"I'm just going to go to the bathroom and put on some make up," she yelled from the living room.

"You don't need that," I yelled back to her. "You're beautiful without."

"I don't want to meet your parents for the first time and look like a walking corpse," she yelled, grinning. I giggled and rolled my eyes. I put my clothes back on and walked out to her again.

"I look like crap compared to you," Lea said, putting her arms around me. I laughed, sarcastically.

"I'm a horse, you're unicorn!" I laughed. She smiled, letting a giggle fall out. She leaned on her toes, to kiss the tip of my nose.

"I love you, did you know that?" she said leaning her head on my collarbones. I smiled and kissed her hair.

"I had a slight idea," I joked.

"Darren, we need to cook!" Lea exclaimed loudly, letting go of me. She grabbed my hand and dragged me out into the kitchen. It took us twenty minutes to cook, and we let the chicken casserole rest on the stove. About five PM my mom and dad arrived.

"Hi Darren!" my mom exclaimed and hugged me tightly. I grabbed her coat.

"Hi mom," I smiled. Lea was sitting in the couch, waiting to get up. We'd kept the whole Lea-me thing a surprise.

"Dad," I said and hugged him.

"Hi, Darren," he smiled and hung his jacket on a rack.

"So what was the surprise?" mom asked me. I smiled to myself.

"Lea, would you come over here?" I said to Lea, who got off the couch. She walked over to me and I placed my arm around her waist. "This is Lea, my co-worker. Also my _pregnant _girlfriend."

I bet Lea was as shocked as my parents were. She didn't know I'd tell them about the pregnancy, but I figured that my parents should know before anyone else. My dad was the first person to react.

"Congratulations," he said and pulled Lea in for a hug first. He smiled. "I'm Charles, by the way."

My mom then went to Lea. "Congratulations," she said smiling and hugged Lea tightly. "You're so beautiful... I'm Cerina."

Lea smiled at my parents. "Thank you for taking this so nicely. I really love your son," she said and grabbed my hand.

"We're happy," my dad said. "Honestly, I've never seen my son with a smile like that before."

Lea giggled and looked at me. "He _does _look quite happy, doesn't he?" she laughed. I grimaced at her, jokingly.

"Thanks, though... for being so supportive," I said to my parents. My mom grabbed the hand Lea wasn't holding.

"That's our job, honey," mom said. I nodded and directed them to the table. Lea brought in plates and cups, and I placed the food in the center of the table. Lea and I sat down across from my parents. My mom took some of the food as the first one.

"So Lea, tell us about yourself. Where did you grow up?" mom asked, as she poured food onto her plate.

"I grew up in a nice little apartment in the Bronx in New York," she answered, placed her elbow on the table and twirled her fingers together to lean on them.

"With both your parents?" mom asked again, passing the pot on to my dad, who took some of the casserole onto his plate.

"Yes, I grew up with both of my parents," she replied. "_And _they're still together."

"Ah, okay. You never know, these times everybody gets divorced," she smiled. She didn't eat yet; she waited until everyone had some. My dad gave me the pot now and I poured eagerly.

"Yeah, a lot of my high school friends' parents got divorced, and I used to be so afraid mine would end like that," Lea confessed, as I gave her the food. I poured it on her plate for her. She thanked me quietly.

"Well Darren used to tell me that true love would never end that way, so he didn't believe Charles and I would get divorced," mom told Lea, who was smiling at me, like crazy. She was so beautiful right now, as always. But the way she'd done her hair today, was even more beautiful than ever. And the way her makeup had been applied; light, yet noticeable, was so flawless.

"Aw Darren!" Lea screeched as she playfully punched me. "You sounded like you were a cute child."

"He was," dad commented. "And so smart."

"I was not," I said, with my eyebrows raised.

"You were. You didn't know math or chemistry, but you knew life," dad explained. "When someone had a bad day, they'd be left happy if you'd been with them."

"That's how I feel around you," Lea shot in. I looked at her, surprised. I guess I looked like one big question mark, because she built on her statement. "Whenever we go through some heavy weight bullshit, you know just the right words to say, to fix it."

"I just don't like seeing anyone feeling down, I guess," I stated. Lea smiled at me and squeezed my knee under the table. Everyone had begun eating. About an hour and a half later, my parents stated that it was time for them to get home to the hotel.

"We'll come by tomorrow," my dad told me, as he got his jacket down from the rack. "We can do something fun, all of us."

Lea and I looked at each other, and both prayed that it'd be indoor fun, since Lea couldn't be seen with my family and me.

"Of course," Lea said and approached my dad. "Thank you so much for tonight, Mr. Criss. It was so nice to meet you."

"You too, darling," dad said to Lea and kissed her lightly on the cheek. My mom approached me, meanwhile.

"You're lucky, Darren. Don't ever take her for granted," she whispered to me, and after doing so, pulled me in for a goodbye hug. I whispered back that I wouldn't ever take her for granted. My mom carried on to say goodbye to Lea, while I said goodbye to my dad. My mom put her hand on Lea's stomach.

"Bye to both of you," she said, referring to Lea and the baby. "I'm so happy about this. I'll see you tomorrow."

Mom and Lea hugged and with that, they left. Lea and I looked at each other, relieved. We began to carry the dirty dishes and pots to the kitchen.

"What about we do the dishes tomorrow?" Lea asked.

"Then you won't be here," I addressed. She smiled as she walked closer to me.

"I figured I could spend the night," she said and played with my shirt. I'm sure my face lit up and a real Colgate-smile plastered onto my face.

"That'd be amazing," I said, lifting her. She giggled, in shock. I carried her all the way to my bedroom and laid her down on the bed. "I'll be right back."

I ran into the living room to collect all the candles I could. I ran back into the bedroom and set them all up. After doing that, as perfect as I could, I lit them all. Lea grinned as I slowly walked to the bed and leaned over her to kiss her. I kissed her from her mouth to the start of her dress.

"Want to get out of it?" I asked her. She bit her lip and nodded. She slowly began to get up from the bed, so I could unzip it. As I did she grinned, and I let it fall to the floor for her to step out of it. We both rolled back onto the bed, kissing each other hungrily. This time when I leaned over her, I kissed her all the way from her lips to her bellybutton. "I can't believe my child is in here."

She smiled and ran her fingers through my curly hair. "I can't believe that, either. It's amazing, isn't it?" she asked. I nodded and kissed her again, but this time I went up. I tried to open her bra, but at first attempt, I failed. I tried again and succeeded. She grinned at me, while I slipped it off her. I stared at her breasts, consuming the beauty of them. I moved closer to her chest, and put my mouth around one of her nipples. I gently sucked on it, but began kissing it instead. I ran my tongue town to where he panties began. Lea giggled, with closed eyes.

"Take them off me," she whispered. I did as she commanded me to, and slipped them off her. She was lying naked in my bed, and the boner in my pants just kept growing. "Your turn."

I smirked and let her crawl on top of me. She kissed me on the neck before she lifted my shirt over my head. She felt around my abs before continuing. She went straight down unbuckling my belt and pulling off my pants as quick as she could. I guess she wanted and needed this as much as me. The giant bump in my boxers, revealed how much I wanted this. She grinned and teased me, by running her hand over it. I moaned, feeling so much pleasure yet pain from the tension this was causing me. She knew she was driving me crazy and she enjoyed every second of it. Finally she grabbed the boxers and pulled them off me. She gently crawled on top of me and sat down on my penis. She let her abdomen hop up and down on me, and we both moaned in unison, so it kind of sounded like two cats dying. But it was amazing, it really was. Every second I got with her were precious seconds that I couldn't be wasted. After a while, we were both close to being there, and my stomach tightened like crazy. _Finally _the tension relieved and we both came together. Lea dropped down next to me, panting heavily.

"Holy mother of fuck," I exclaimed. Lea grinned, while breathing heavily.


	16. Chapter 16

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hi guys, sorry i havent updated in a while, i've been fed up with other stuff. this is going to be fluffy, and i wanted to try to make lea and darren fight a little bit so that's in there too. :)**

Lea's POV:

I woke up next to Darren, feeling amazing because I felt his presence there. I smiled a bit knowing no one could come between us now. Not Ryan, not Cory, not anybody. I wrapped my legs around his and felt him move as I did so. He slowly opened his eyes, and looked tiredly at me.

"Good morning," he said and placed a light kiss on my nose. I smiled, and kissed his nose back.

"Good morning," I replied. He grinned and removed some hair from my face.

"We should probably get up," he suggested, and tried to get up. I pulled him down on the bed again.

"Why? No one's on our ass today. We have all day just... lying here," I explained. "Why would we want to spoil that?"

He grinned lightly and intertwined his fingers with mine. "I'm pretty sure my parents said something about doing something with them today," he said, cupping my face. "And I want to, while they're in town."

"I understand. I just like the fact that we can't be interrupted today," I explained and got off the bed. "But I understand you, though."

I began dressing myself, finding my clothes all around Darren's apartment, since he undressed me all over the place. When I finally got undressed, Darren walked out only wearing shorts.

"Why didn't you just borrow a t-shirt?"

"Because I'd like to actually be prepared if your parents come unannounced. I know they know that we've had sex, since I'm pregnant, but they don't have to see me walk around half naked in your apartment," I grinned, as he grabbed my waist and kissed me. I began laughing as his lips hit mine, causing him to laugh too. His hands ran through my hair, as he looked me in the eye trying to kiss me again.

"Maybe we should grab breakfast?" Darren whispered, leaning his forehead on mine. I nodded, the best I could and let him walk into the kitchen. I sat on his kitchen chair and watched him prepare the breakfast. When he was done he placed it all on a plate before me and then grabbed a plate for us both.

"I love that you're cooking for me," I proclaimed. Darren grinned.

"I'm just toasting bread really..."

"You know what I mean. It feels like we're actually a normal couple, right now," I said and grabbed the bread he gave me. I put some butter on it and then took a bite.

"I know the feeling," he cupped my neck and kissed my forehead, before sitting down before me and eating the bread himself. Suddenly I started thinking about Darren's brother, and how I should probably meet him too soon.

"Honey?" I asked. He looked at me and nodded. "Don't I get to meet your brother, soon?"

"Chuck? Sure! Whenever you want," he smiled and kept eating his bread. "When do you want to?"

"Well, as soon as possible. I want to get to know your family, and quickly," I said. I don't think it was very polite to be pregnant and then not meeting the family of the father. For the family of course. Not rude to me.

"I know. I can call him now and invite him over?" he suggested. I nodded and drank some of the juice on the table. For a moment I just sat there in the chair in Darren's kitchen absorbing what I really had, when you looked at it roughly. I had a man who was crazy about me and I was going to have his child. So what, if one man wanted to knock me down. No matter what I did, or what mistakes I could make, I would always have Darren around. But sooner or later I had to confront Ryan, properly. He _had _to give me a reason why he had so much hatred toward Darren and I. I heard Darren's voice, talking on the phone, indistinctly. I wasn't listening. I was too calm to. A minute or two after he'd dialed, he hung up and went back to the table.

"So, um, Chuck's coming today. He wants us to go to the beach," Darren said slowly.

"Oh, well. We'll find something better to do at home," I said smiling. He looked worried, and I knew something was up with him. "What did you do?"

"I kind of said that we'd go to the beach with him," he stuttered. My mouth opened slightly.

"You know that we can't! Why didn't you tell him that we couldn't?" I yelled.

"What the Hell was I supposed to say?" he yelled back at me. I sighed and got up from the table.

"Tell him the truth, Darren," I said quietly. Secretly, I was guilty. Guilty that my parents thought I was with Cory, when I wasn't. I'd never lied to my parents that way before. I never lied, especially not to people I loved, but Ryan was pushing me to the breaking point. "I need to go..."

Before he could stop me, I hurried out of the door and ran down the stairs. I heard him come after me, but I ran to my car and drove as fast I could home. I ran to my front door, stuck the key in the door very hard, missed and dropped my keys.

"Fuck!" I cried. I didn't know why I was crying, I just knew that I was feeling terrible. And to think that just ten minutes ago, I was sitting in Darren's kitchen happier than ever before. I was kind of pathetic. To let my life be controlled by a man, who didn't even have a reason for doing so. "Love is strongest" right? Well if it is, why am I feeling this way? Why can't Darren and I just be happy for once? I laid on my couch after entering my apartment. I instantly dropped my body on the couch. I felt so heavy, not fat, just heavy. Heavy inside. After a while I fell asleep and I woke up to find several messages from Darren on the machine.

_"Lee. Please just come back, I don't want to be alone. I'm sorry that I yelled. Call me," _Darren's voice echoed through the apartment. I was too empty to feel anything, so I didn't feel a need to go back.

_"Why aren't you picking up? I tried your cell, that doesn't work either. You have to be home... I'm going to your place in thirty minutes and if you're not there... man I don't know what I'll do,"_ this time he sounded more worried that anything else. I couldn't see when the message had gotten received, so for all I know Darren could already have stopped by. A few minutes later I found out that, that wasn't true. The buzzer rang and I stuck my head out the window to see who it was, and of course it was him. Who else would visit me?

"What do you want!" I yelled down to him. He looked up in shock. I looked around to see if I could spot any paparazzi and since I couldn't, I let my head stick out.

"I just want to talk it out, Lee. We can't be mad over something that small!" he yelled back up. I swallowed a lump there'd grown in my throat. I fought the tears that were appearing for no reason.

"Isn't it just a bit pointless?"

"What is?" he asked. I sighed, but he couldn't hear me.

"Us. This. What we're doing here, it makes no sense," I said loudly. He looked stunned.

"C'mon don't say that..." he tried.

"No, this doesn't make any sense!"

"We love each other, don't we?" he asked. I had to nod, because we did. "When two people love each other, do you think they should be apart or do you think they should be together, no matter what the obstacles are?"

"Number 2..." I mumbled to myself. He obviously didn't hear me. I walked over to my front door and buzzed him in. He ran as fast as he could to my apartment. "I just want to talk it out, and I didn't want the rest of the street to be able to hear."

He walked in and sat on the couch. I walked over to him and sat between his legs. "There's nothing in this world that could ever explain my love for you," he mumbled into my ear, as he started nibbling it.

"I love you so much," I just said. I knew that we didn't have to say that we loved each other, because we knew it, but a little reassurance was good.

"What do you say we just stay home and watch a movie with Chuck and then call for pizza later?" he asked me. I nodded.

"Best plan, all day," I giggled. I got off from the couch and moved to the kitchen to grab a glass of water for us both. We were both a bit heated, at least I was. I put down the glass slowly, and placed it on the counter. "I've been thinking about confronting Ryan. Like properly."

"Like ask him why he's doing this?"

"Yeah and demanding a legit answer from him," I explained. "I mean you can't just be this crazy with no reason. He must have like a reason..."

"Or else this is utter bullshit," Darren said and drank the rest of his water in one slurp.

"It already is," I mumbled and looked in the other direction. "Maybe we should start going back to your apartment."

"Yeah, I bet Chuck's already there though," Darren said.

CHUCK'S POV:

I was waiting in Darren's apartment. I actually didn't even know why he wasn't here, I just knew he kept a spare key under the doormat. Very cliché. As I decided to watch some TV, Darren and Lea Michele walked through the door. I, casually, walked over to them.

"Um hi," I said, awkwardly. I had no idea why he would've taken Lea Michele with him to his apartment. But she smiled and reached out her hand to me.

"Hi, I'm Lea."

"I'm Chuck," I responded shaking her hand, probably looking like one big question mark. Before Darren even said hi to me, he introduced Lea.

"Lea's my... girlfriend," he said, hesitating. I raised my eyebrows. "And she's pregnant."

"Oh... So you have a girlfriend and you're going to be a dad?" I asked looking back and forth between them. They both looked nervous. There was more to this than them just being nervous to tell me. They were definitely hiding something.

"Pretty much," he responded. I smiled, big.

"I'm so happy for you two!" I said and hugged Darren first, then went to her. "If you get tired of him, just punch him... that normally makes him cool down."

She chuckled lightly. "I don't think I'm going to get tired of him. Not any time soon at least," she explained. Darren punched me playfully, playing with his eyebrows.

"Twenty-five years does something to a guy," I joked and elbowed Darren in his side. He pretended to be hurt, which caused Lea to laugh. When I looked at her, I could actually see how perfect she were for my brother. I could really see them starting a family. But there were something there, which made them both nervous. I had to find out what.

"Well, why don't we watch a movie?" Darren suggested. He directed us to the couch and took out his collection of disney movies. "Choose."

"I love Tarzan," Lea said and sat down in the couch. I agreed by nodding.

"Tarzan it is," he said and put the movie in the DVD. He grabbed a giant blanket and we all sat on the couch. Me to the left, Lea in the middle and Darren to the right. It was cozy watching the movie with them, and halfway into the movie their nervousness dropped and at last I didn't feel it any more. Maybe they had just been fighting in the car on their way here or something. In the end of the movie, Lea was crying and laughed at herself.

"I'm so sensitive," she laughed while shedding the last few tears. Darren laughed and put her arms around her.

"It's disney, honey. Everyone's sensitive," he giggled. She laughed.

"I don't see you two _macho's _crying over a dead monkey," she shrieked, jokingly.

"I'm pretty sure it was a gorilla," I joked. She punched me playfully on the arm. "And I'm talking about Clayton."

They both laughed. Darren went to turn the movie off, and Lea didn't take her eyes off him for one minute. They seemed so happy, but there was definitely something that wasn't quite right.


	17. Chapter 17

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: hi sorry i didnt update for a while, but here the chapter is ...oh and this'll be the end of the Ryan thing, and then I'll write fluff and shit, like an every day fic. feel free to come with ideas:)**

Darren's POV:

I woke up in my apartment, alone in my bed. Chuck was in the guest room, since he didn't feel like going home last night. But it was weird waking up with no one next to me in my bed... not that I wanted Chuck to lie next to me. I wanted Lea. I decided to get up and go to the kitchen to grab some breakfast. Chuck was still sleeping and probably would be for a few more hours. I picked up the phone and dialed Lea's number.

"Hey," she cooed as she picked up. She'd seen it was me calling.

"Hi, can you sneak over?" I asked her. There was a little pause in our phone conversation, and then she sighed.

"I'm meeting Cory's parents today," she slowly said. My heart broke into a million pieces, and I almost dropped the phone. My whole body went numb. "Ryan said so."

"Wait, so you're meting Cory's parents and letting them know that you're dating their son?" I asked, and scratched my neck.

"Pretty much," she answered. I could hear that she was sad about this.

"Where are you meeting them?"

"In his apartment," Lea answered.

"Wait, so this isn't something to get the media to believe it?" I asked. Lea was about to answer, but I answered myself. "You're kidding! So he just really wants everyone to believe you're together. What about your parents?"

"They've met Cory... They think I'm with him," when she said those eight words, I was so angry I could punch walls. I decided to just hang up. She called back, but I declined the call. I sat down on my couch, massaging my eyelids for a moment before I turned on the TV. I flipped through the channels and wound up at BBC1 which was sending Doctor Who. I decided to just watch it, and it made me feel better. I was calm again when the show was over. Chuck slowly awoke, and I heard him stretch in the sheets. He walked into the living room.

"What's up?" Chuck asked. I guess he could tell something was wrong. He read me like an open book, and I hated it.

"It doesn't matter," I answered through my teeth. I don't know why I was so angry, I just was.

"If you had said that, and convinced me I would've left it alone, but seriously? You're an actor, you can do better than that," Chuck joked, as he playfully punched my arm and sat down on the couch.

"It's just Lea," I confessed without thinking about further explanation.

"Did she end it?" Chuck asked. I looked at him, with a face that probably wasn't so nice.

"No. She's just... weak, I guess."

"Wait, wait, wait. What?" Chuck said confused and leaned back in the couch. He was obviously expecting a longer story.

"Our director Ryan Murphy, he's forcing Lea to date Cory Monteith for publicity. But as you know she and I are together," I muttered. Chuck's eyebrows were raised when I looked back at him.

"Why's he forcing her to do that?" he asked, quietly.

"We've never gotten a reason," I answered. He raised his eyebrows even more.

"You're kidding."

"I'm not."

"So you're saying that Ryan is being a douche for no reason?" Chuck asked as he scratched his scruff, and crossed his legs. I sighed a deep sigh before having the means to answer the question.

"That's quite accurate," I answered, after a lot of thinking how to answer that question. It felt like I didn't have many thoughts left in my head. I was just so fucking sick of Ryan being like this. "Hey, I think I got an idea."

"What idea?" Chuck asked confusedly. I smiled mischiveiosly

"I'll have to break up with Lea to make it work, but it'll be great!" I mumbled to myself as I got off the couch and went for the phone. Chuck followed me and scratched his hair in wonder.

"What are you saying?" he said when I stopped at the phone. I sighed and turned around.

"In order to get the whole Ryan thing to pass, I have to break up with Lea today, so she will stay away from me and hang on Cory for one day and then tomorrow I'm going to announce that she and I have always been together and never her and Cory," I began as I dialed Lea's number. I didn't press call yet though. "And of course the whole baby thing. And of course the reason behind all this."

Chuck looked so confused, but yet he just nodded and let me press call. "Darren! I'm so glad, you're calling. I'm so sorry about this morning," she said into the phone, with a lot of enthusiasm that I called her. I had to act cold with her though... After all I had to pretend like I was really breaking up with her.

"Yeah, about that... I don't think we should see each other anymore," I said. Chuck looked at me and shook his head. I gave him a look that said it was vital.

"What..?" Lea mumbled. I could hear she was on the breaking point to a cry. I had to bite my lip to not cry.

"I want to break up with you," I said, trying to hold my cold facade. I wanted to tell her so badly that I was doing this to make us happy, and it was not real. But she'd just say there was another way to do that.

"I'm pregnant, Darren... You can't just do this," she whimpered. My knees got weak under me. I hated hearing her like this, it broke my heart.

"I'm sure you'll be a great single mother," I said, shivering when I let the words slip out. I was a douche right now, and I knew that. "Bye, Lea."

I hung up and looked at Chuck who sighed. "Was that really necessary?" he asked. I ran my fingers through my hair.

"Yes. It's the only way she could ever think my idea was okay. She'd kill me if I just told her my plan," I said and sat down on a chair next to the coffee table. "It hurt like Hell, though..."

"Of course it did. You didn't want to break up with her for real. You love her," Chuck stated. I nodded. I loved her like I'd never ever loved someone before. Knowing that I hurt her this bad right now, slowly tore me apart inside. I had an inner fight with myself to not call her, and tell her the truth, but I had to last for an entire day.

A few hours later Chuck was still at my apartment and we were watching TV. I flipped through the channels a bit, before we stopped on E!News when we spotted Lea's face.

"What is she doing on E?" I asked, mostly to myself. Chuck shrugged, and he was as confused as me.

_"I want to tell the truth, for once," _Lea began. She was doing what I had planned. _"Ryan Murphy, the creator and writer of Glee has been pressuring me to pretend to be in love with a person I'm nowhere near in love with. The truth is that I don't love Cory Monteith, or I do, but as a friend. Who I really love is Darren Criss. But Mr. Murphy did not want me to express that, since he thought that me and Cory being an item would make his show better. And I have to admit that I was weak, and I did as he told me to. I was afraid of losing my job. I was afraid of losing myself. I was protecting my reputation, but frankly I just don't care anymore. I got a phone call a few hours ago from Darren, breaking up with me. I know it was because of this situation. I had to tell my parents that I was in a relationship with Cory. My mom and dad doesn't even know that I'm in love with Darren. And pregnant with his child. I'm standing here today, telling this, because I've had enough. I don't want to lose Darren because of Mr. Murphy. So take this as my resignation from Glee. I'm Lea Michele, and you're watching E!News." _

__Chuck and I slowly looked at each other, moping. After a while I broke into a laughter, and picked up my phone to dial her number. She picked up after three beeps.

"Did you watch E!News?" she asked immediately. I smiled, and laughed again.

"Yes, I did! That was what I was going to do tomorrow, Lea," I said, still smiling. I heard her laugh at the other end.

"I'm coming over to your apartment, right away," she said and hung up. I was still smiling when I turned around to look at Chuck who was smirking.

"So you actually did fix this with your terrible plan," he said. I nodded, being completely speechless. It was like we were free. "Even though I now know who is the boss of you two! She took matters into her own hand."

"She's not weak, like she said... She's so strong," I said to myself. Lea just loved who she were and what she had, that's why she obeyed Ryan... But I guess she finally realized that a kid and me was what she'd rather have. Two minutes later, Lea was banging on my door. I quickly opened and almost cried of happiness when I saw her.

"It feels so good not having to avoid paparazzi on my way over," she stated and wrapped her arms around me. I kissed her forehead and took her purse and hung it on a rack.

"I'm so fucking proud of you for doing that, Lea," I said and hugged her again. "You're so strong, you know that?"

"I'm not strong... I just hit a reality check," she mumbled, and sat down in the couch next to Chuck. She said hi to him as I moved over to sit next to her.

"You are strong though," I said. "And I really admire that about you."

"You're stronger... you were so emotionless on the phone. Not many people could pull that off... unless you weren't acting emotionless," she said slowly. I smiled at her, signaling that I was acting emotionless.

"I could never do that to you, and trust me... it took all my strength to not call you and tell the truth," I explained. Chuck just sat and smiled at our conversation.

"Maybe I should give you two some space?" he said, still smiling. He got ready to leave, but Lea pulled him back down on the couch.

"No! You're officially my boyfriend's brother, and I want to spend time with you," Lea said and grinned. "What do you guys want to do?"

"Aw, I don't know. We could go outside? To the beach?" Chuck suggested. Lea nodded in agreement and looked questioning at me.

"Of course," I said. Lea jumped off the couch in happiness and dragged me up with her. We packed a beach picnic basket and Chuck and I grabbed some bathing shorts and put our clothes over it. We had to swing by Lea's place to get her bikini. So we got in my car and when we reached Lea's place she ran up the stairs and got changed and then rushed back down to the car. When we were at the beach, some paparazzi spotted us and began to take pictures. Lea and I were hand in hand and Chuck was walking next to us. We all went down and found a spot in the sand, to place our blanket on. At first we laid down and tanned for a while, but then Lea wanted to go in the water since he was sweating. When we went out to the water, Lea got skeptical since she thought the water was cold, but I lifted her up and went out with her.

"Darren, don't!" she screamed as she laughed at me. Chuck was already swimming in the water, laughing at us. I dropped Lea and I in the water and she quickly got up again, putting her arms around her body, shivering. "I will kill you."

I laughed and ran out to Chuck and swam away from Lea, who refused to get under the water to chase me. I swam back to her and pulled her in. When we got to the surface again she laughed and fake punched me.

"Come on Lee, if you don't get in now, you never will," I said. She pushed her eyebrows together and went under the water again. When she was used to it we swam out to Chuck again. Suddenly Lea crawled on me and kissed me.

"It feels great to be able to go outside with you," she whispered in my ear. She was right. This felt amazing.


	18. Chapter 18

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: hi, it's been awhile. Don't hate me, I've been having midterms and now I can FINALLY write on this story, again! And also, I've been going through a rough family time, so I haven't really felt like continuing, but now I am! :) (and I will start updating every saturday now) **

Lea's POV:

After a wonderful day to the beach with Darren, we drove home and ordered some dinner. Chuck and I both agreed on Chinese, but Darren insisted on Italian, so we compromised and got both from a takeaway place. Darren and I were so ecstatic about being able to go outside together that we insisted on not calling for the food, but picking it up ourselves. A few people turned their heads when we walked past them on the street, and that made me smile. I didn't even know why, but it just did. I guess I was just overwhelmed by happiness in this very moment, and many people would probably think me weird for being happy about simply going outside with my boyfriend, but if you'd been through what I'd been with Ryan and Cory, you'd be happy too. As we were walking down the street, on our way to buy the food, Darren grabbed my hand and pulled me closer to his body. I looked at his face and saw him grinning at me.

"Isn't it weird that we're _this _excited over getting food together?" he grinned, showing his perfectly white teeth.

"Well to people who doesn't know who we are, probably. But frankly, I don't give a shit. I think it's perfectly normal for us to be excited over this," I said and smiled back at him. We kept walking until we reached the first store, that was where me and Chuck were getting our food from. Darren ordered it, while I sat outside by a table and waited for him.

"Twenty minutes, then it's ready," Darren said and he walked out of the store, folding his wallet and putting into his back pocket. He sat down at the same table I was at. Suddenly I thought of Ryan, and if he had seen the interview I did for E! He must've at least seen the news on the internet. How'd he react?

"Have you seen any articles on the internet with Ryan's statement?" I asked Darren, who shrugged. "I mean, he must've made a statement."

"I don't know, maybe not yet... it was pretty acute you did it," Darren answered, and looked at his watch. "And only four hours ago. Maybe he'll make a statement tomorrow."

I didn't really listen to Darren, I just pulled out my phone, ready to check the internet. I clicked the unlock button on my iPhone and noticed a message from Ian Brennan, who called Darren and I in for a meeting, tomorrow morning at 8. I screamed internally, because, _of course did our happiness have to be ruined immediately. _I sighed and passed my phone to Darren who looked at the message before looking up at me and going: "Oh."

"Yeah, what now?" I asked myself, and got my iPhone back. I went through all kinds of news websites, but found no statements from Ryan. After roughly twenty minutes, a chinese lady came out with a bag with our food in it. Darren thanked her and we walked to the place where he was getting food. We waited ten minutes there before we could go home to Chuck, who was half-lying on the couch watching TV.

"Hey! You're back, any news?" he asked, as if we had run into Ryan on the way, or something.

"Nah, we've just been called in for a meeting tomorrow," Darren told his brother, who looked surprised.

"Wow, I thought a resignation was enough for them to cut their bullshit out," he said, and went to get his food from the bag. "Ooh, they put in shrimp chips!"

"And fortune cookies," I told him when I discovered the fortune cookies in a tiny bag. I opened one and read it _"good news from afar may bring you a welcome visitor." _

"What does yours say?" Chuck asked me. I read it aloud. "It sounds so smart, yet so stupid."

The rest of the night just went by with talking, eating and watching stupid reality shows. Darren and I went early to bed, because we had a meeting at 8 already. I woke up at 7:01 AM, by Darren's arm right in my face.

"Darren, move your arm!" I yelled at him. He groaned and turned around, pulling his arm off my face. "You need to wake," I told him and poked him in the side. He screamed at jumped up.

"I'm awake! Jesus Christ, Lea," he said. I crawled toward him, sat on his lap and kissed him gently on the lips. "'Morning."

"'Morning," I said and kissed him again. He grabbed my neck and deepened the kiss, until I had to stop him. "We don't have time for that."

"Damn," he said, as I crawled off him. I tried to find my clothes in Darren's mess, which took a lot of time. He was quite messy. "If you're looking for your pants, they're in the bathroom. Where you took them off." His tone screamed sassiness.

"Smart ass," I mumbled, and heard him laugh. I went out to the bathroom and, like he said, there they were. I put them on and went back to Darren's bedroom, where he was on his bed, still not dressed. "Do you want me to make some breakfast?"

"Sure, but just grab us some cereal, that's fine by me," he told me as he pulled a t-shirt over his head. I went out into the kitchen, found two bowls and poured milk and cornflakes in both. I put the bowls on his dining table and started eating without him. After a few minutes he came into the dining room and sat down across me and began eating.

"You think Ian is pissed at us too?" I asked Darren. He just shook his head and grinned.

"I honestly don't think they knew about Ryan's 'plan'," Darren suggested, and ate the final cornflakes. I was way slower, I wasn't even close to finishing them yet. He took the bowl out in the kitchen, and then came back in. "You need to hurry it's 7:40 now."

"You're rushing me," I complained and hurried to eat the rest. When I was done, I put the bowl in the kitchen and ran to Darren, who gave me my coat. I kissed him lightly and thanked him, before we went out of the apartment and down to his car. The closer we got, the more nervous I got. I had nothing to fear, though, I just hated conflicts. And maybe it was stupid of me to say, on TV, that I resigned from Glee. It wasn't _just _a job, it was like my whole life. Darren looked very calm and collected as he drove the car into the FOX parking lot. I quickly got out of the car, and went to his side of the car, to grab his hand. He could sense my nervousness.

"Nothing's going to happen," he whispered in my ear, when we were outside Ian's office. Inside were Ryan, Ian and Brad, all sitting on different chairs. They had two chairs arranged across them for me and Darren to sit on. I let go of his hand and went to sit down. After Darren had sat down Ian broke the silence.

"Good morning," he said and offered a crooked smile. "We saw your report on E!news yesterday, Lea. And, I have to say, it was quite a surprise to hear what Ryan has been doing."

I cracked a smile, for the first time in the same room as Ryan. It was him they were pissed at and not me. I sighed in relief, and they all noticed.

"Of course, we don't accept your resignation, Lea," Brad cut in. "It's not your responsibility, it's clearly Ryan's."

"So everyone at FOX has agreed to fire him," Ian took over again. "And we've asked Ryan to come here, for the last time, to apologize, formally to you and Darren."

Darren and I looked at each other, and then at Ryan who just sat there looking incredibly angry. Ryan apologized to us, and we accepted it, and then he left the room.

"We hope you both still want to keep your parts on the show," Brad said, and we both nodded. "Well, that was it, really. I'll see you on Thursday then."

We all said bye and when Darren and I got back to the parking lot, I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him.

"I've never been more relieved," I told Darren, who agreed and kissed me on my forehead. We went home to Darren's apartment and found out that Chuck wasn't awake yet, so had some time to be alone in the bedroom. We started kissing in the hallway and kissed all the way into his bedroom, where he threw me on his bed and kissed my neck. I started to pull at his t-shirt, attempting to get it off. Finally, he took it off himself and threw it across the room. He started unbuttoning my blouse and when he finally had done all the buttons he lifted my body to get it off me. He threw it to the floor, and then continued to kiss me from my neck down to my breasts. I grinned and ran my fingers through his flawless hair. He kissed my stomach, down to where my pants began, then he stopped to unbutton them too. He started to pull them off and grinned as he kissed my legs all the way up to my panties, where he stopped and switched positions.

"Your turn," he smirked. I smiled, and began to kiss his lips, then I moved down to his neck and kept moving more and more down until I reached his pants. I quickly unbuttoned them and pulled them off. I could see his hard-on through his boxers, and bit my lips, and then crawled on top of him and started to kiss him, hungrily, on the lips.

"You don't know how much I want you," I whispered in his ear. He wrestled me down and started to kiss me all over my body. I moaned quietly, knowing that Chuck was in the next room, sleeping. He put his hands under me, undid my bra and pulled it off. He gently caressed my breasts, while kissing me on my lips. My hands were running all over his back, rubbing him. He went down to my panties and pulled them off, and then let me pull his boxers off him.

"You're so beautiful," he told me, just before entering me. I moaned, a little bit too loud. He groaned when he started to go back and forth. I moaned as he said my name. He went faster and faster, and it all seemed like I was floating in ecstasy. Sex with him was amazing; like no other I had ever experienced before. It was times like these I really believed we were meant for each other. He pulled out of me, suddenly and turned roles, so I was on top of him. I sat on his penis and started bouncing up and down. Finally, we both reached climax, and he pulled out of me before he came inside of me. I laid down next to him, and put my head on his chest. He put his arms around me, and kissed me in my hair. This was absolutely perfect.


End file.
